Dear readers,
I spent a lot of last week trying to figure out what kind of coverage of the trial of Dellen Millard and Mark Smich for the murder of Tim Bosma that I could bring you.
At first I thought I’d do daily dispatches, but that proved too onerous. And if I just do the highlights, I’m simply doing what everyone else is doing while not really delivering any value added.
After taking a few days to think about what I can do here on my website that not every other reporter in the room is doing, I’ve decided to try and host an ongoing AMA. AMA — if you’re not familiar with the term, which originates with Reddit — stands for Ask Me Anything.
Although in this case, it will have to be Ask Me Anything that I can answer without the risk of being in contempt of court. A trial is a very sensitive time. Journalists take great pains to only report on what’s said and done in court in front of the jury. We can’t cover anything else.
So that means you can AMA about what happens in court in front of the jury and I will try to provide the answer. After a few days, I’ll assess whether it’s a workable plan for the rest of the trial.
Please ask your question(s) by leaving a comment and I will answer when I get the chance. My goal is to do so asap after you ask it, but I don’t want to make promises I can’t keep. This is a work in progress.
As you may have noticed, I’ve turned on comment approval for the duration of this trial.
Needless to say, the fact that I haven’t let a few comments through has left some people fuming. To them, I say, “Just let me know when you’ve signed the contract stating you will pay all future legal fees related to commenting on this blog and you’ve set up a provisional bank account for the retainer. Then we’ll talk. Until then sayonara.”
But enough about the ingrates, I’m sure you have lots of good questions so fire away, and I’ll do what I can to answer and create something here different from what the MSM is doing.
For some more background on the first week of trial, check out this CTV report on the so-called “cutthroat defence” being employed:
I’ve created a Twitter list if you want to follow the reporters covering the trial in real time. You can also follow my Twitter feed or sign up for my newsletter depending on how you prefer to get your news alerts.
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