TELEVISION - March 12, 1996

Crime Time: Led by the O.J. Simpson murder trial and the Oklahoma City bombing tragedy, the three network evening news shows featured a record number of crime stories in 1995, some 76 hours of air time, according to the Center for Media and Public Affairs in Washington. Crime news accounted for nearly one of every five stories on the newscasts last year, with 2,574 such reports outnumbering those about Bosnia, the U.S. economy and the federal budget battle combined. The Simpson trial was featured in 874 stories, the Oklahoma City tragedy in 336, while the networks broadcast 1,364 stories about other crimes--four times as much crime news as in 1991, even though crime declined somewhat during the same period. The statistics were taken from the media center’s eighth annual TV news survey. Researchers examined 13,617 stories broadcast on ABC, CBS and NBC nightly newscasts.