The College Perspective by Lindsey

After the recent bombing and bomb threats in New York and New Jersey, the police have a suspect: Ahmad Rahami. Found asleep in a bar doorway, Rahami became wounded in a gun fight with police before they took him into custody. Rahami ran a chicken restaurant with his family which neighbors complained about multiple times after the establishment attracted loud and disruptive customers at all hours of the day. Despite this, the neighbors and customers of the restaurant say he was easygoing and kind until he made a trip to the Middle East a few years back. When he returned he was married, wore more traditional Muslim clothing, and had a more serious demeanor, which confused some neighbors because of the sudden change. Rahami was not in the family restaurant at the time of the bombings.

This story is newsworthy because it provides useful insight into who could potentially be behind the bombings and give people some closure with what happened. The audience is primarily the people who were in the area affected but I think it could also apply to most Americans who are following this story. The lead isn’t a standard, just the facts kind of lead, but uses some creativity to introduce Rahami as an ordinary person, not some alienated criminal. I believe this makes the story more effective for people to understand.

While this story presents Rahami as a regular person, the author also seems to take some leaps in conclusions about how Rahami is guilty and repeats information that makes him look worse to cement it in people’s minds that he is to blame, whether or not that is true yet. The author could have taken out several paragraphs about Rahami’s personal life that don’t seem as important to the story, like the fact that his family was supposedly bankrupt. They also could have removed the repeated phrases taken from neighbors of Rahami, because as the article is relatively short, the people should remember the quotes and not have to be reminded in the middle of what was said at the beginning. Overall, the story could have been revised once more before being posted.