A Reporter’s View on Covering Legal Cases

by Romilda Perfidio


Pete McCarthy recently accepted a position with the Gloucester County Times, in Woodbury, NJ. He has worked for the Times for about a week. We recently spoke on the phone about his previous coverage of legal cases.

McCarthy worked as a legal correspondent for over three years for The Bridgeton News, in Bridgeton, NJ. He covered trial cases and fortunately had little obstacles in his gathering of information.


McCarthy claims, “It depends on who you’re dealing with." He says he sometimes faced opposition with getting information from lawyers, but for the most part it wasn’t difficult. McCarthy contributes this to the fact that he worked for a small paper. He says, “it’s not really an issue with local papers.”

I asked McCarthy his opinion of high profile cases and how they have changed news coverage. He claims, “It really wasn’t an issue and did not come up."

He was not very forthcoming in our telephone conversation and was reluctant to speak with me about legal cases. In all, seven reporters were contacted; two from the Philadelphia Inquirer, two from the Courier Post, one from the Philadelphia Weekly, one from Philly News and Pete McCarthy. He was the only reporter who responded to my inquiry.