Last week, there was a front-page story in the Sun Journal about a fugitive who was caught by a Sun Journal photographer. That raises my concerns about an increasing tendency of the news media to create news and to report on its own activities.

Without waiting for backup or leaving officers on the ground to block possible escape routes, Lewiston police went up to the third floor of a building. The fugitive ran out and jumped. “They watched from the balcony and hoped that Dillingham would step in.” One officer “screamed down, ‘Tackle him, Russ! Tackle him.'”

Is this proper police work? Was this really the right time for police to enlist the help of a citizen? That fugitive had been arrested just a week before. With a sprained ankle from his jump, it seems he would soon have been captured again. Were those questions even considered in the newspaper’s effort to applaud itself for the photographer’s activities?

The situation reminds me of WGME’s “Fugitive Files,” an apparent partnership with the Sun Journal. Gregg Lagerquist, with police officers manning the phones in the background telethon-like, presents several cases of purportedly bad characters wanted by the police. Citizen tips are solicited. Later on, the news reports how the “Fugitive Files” (theme music here) captured some of those bad characters.

With these activities, the media moves down the slippery slope from covering breaking news and stories to making news and making up stories.

Michael Hopkins, Lewiston