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OPINION: Child abuse trial brings out worst online(News & Observer, The (Raleigh, NC) (KRT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Jun. 1--The ongoing soap opera that is the Lynn Paddock trial illustrates a divergence in the standards of journalism as practiced in print and online. Sensational enough are the newspaper versions of the stories about the trial of the Johnston County woman charged in the murder of her adoptive son, 4-year-old Sean Paddock. In the Smithfield trial, Paddock's other adoptive children last week accused her of torture, mental intimidation and such extreme humiliation as forcing them to eat their own feces and vomit. The N&O updates the stories each day on its Web site, www.newsobserver.com, so people can keep up with breaking developments. It also has run video from the trial and created forums for readers to comment on the case. Some of the online content, especially the children's compelling, graphic testimony on videotape, adds a dimension to the coverage that print could not achieve. The forums allow readers to participate directly in the story. But much of the comment is less than elevating. One forum asks readers, "What should happen in the Lynn Paddock case?" Some responses (verbatim): --"Fry the crazy bitch." --"I think that ever person that beat or treat a child like this woman have done should be lined up beside an wall and shot to death." --"Paddock is a child murderer. Execute her, and do so swiftly." --"She should be skinned alive. Put in a coffin full of rats and buried with an air line so that she stays alive until the rats have had enough time to eat her." And on and on. Those are comments that would never be allowed in letters to the editor in the printed N&O. You can see this stuff at http://share.triangle.com/node/15847. I have two concerns about this commentary. One is the extreme viciousness; it detracts from, rather than contributes to, productive community dialogue about the case. The other issue is that, as loathsome are the acts of which Paddock is accused, she is innocent until proven guilty. The trial isn't over, but The N&O is providing a venue for people who are ready to sidestep the judicial process and rush her to the gallows. I think the wording of the question -- What should happen in the Lynn Paddock case? -- invites that kind of response. The editors overseeing the online coverage defend it as a natural way to engage the readers in the story via an additional N&O platform. "Our philosophy is that we want to leave it as open-ended as possible because we do not want to frame the conversation," said Eric Frederick, online managing editor. "We do not want to steer the comments." Mike Williams, Triangle.com editor, said he tries to read every comment and removes posts only if they go beyond bounds of decency, such as comments that are racist or sexist or otherwise extremely offensive. He said it's acceptable for people to say Paddock should be executed -- even in graphic terms -- but he would intervene if someone actually threatened her with violence. He has not removed any comments from this forum but said a couple "were borderline" including one that said Paddock "should burn in Hell." There actually was much in the two online forums -- another asked readers what they thought about Paddock's disciplinary style -- that was thoughtful and did contribute to community understanding. Sean Paddock's birth mother and grandparents posted comments explaining why they had given the child up for adoption, and readers had direct online conversations with them. People raised questions about the role of social workers in placing Sean and his siblings in Paddock's care, an issue that The N&O has addressed but merits further examination. Williams said the story has produced one of the highest online responses of any forum this year -- 66 comments and 2,250 hits from May 15 through Thursday. Stories involving children and violence tend to draw the most emotional response from readers, he said. That was the case in Cincinnati last year when a toddler died of heatstroke when her mother left her alone in the car. The story generated lots of comment, some downright cruel, said Chris Graves, deputy managing editor of The Cincinnati Enquirer. "There were nasty comments in there ... but underneath that tone and the accusations were the basis of really good stories and fodder for stories and also for the larger community to think about," she told the Poynter Institute, a training center for journalists. "It's a brave new world out there and one we don't fully own anymore as journalists. The community is requiring us to rethink and retool ourselves. Frankly, I think that's a beautiful thing. I think that's the basis of the First Amendment." But Graves also said that The Enquirer deleted as many as 30 percent of comments responding to stories on any given day. The Web does offer a newspaper and its readers greater opportunity for community exchange and understanding of issues. But it also places greater responsibility on the paper to keep the conversation on a productive plane. The Public Editor can be reached at [email protected] or by calling (919) 836-5700. To see more of The News & Observer, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.newsobserver.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The News & Observer, Raleigh, N.C. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. 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