Now I'm the first to admit I like cop shows - CSI, Law and Order, The Closer, The Bill (for those reading this in the UK) - who doesn't like to watch the suspect squirm and lie their way out of a tricky situation in the interview room? But do I want to watch it for real?
There seems to be a disturbing new trend for watching genuine police interviews. These videos are released to the media by the police and posted on websites including MSN and the BBC.
Today on http://www.bbc.co.uk/ you can watch British mother Karen Matthews being 'grilled' by police over the kidnapping of her daughter. Matthews has just been found guilty of the kidnap, drugging and concealment of her own daughter in order to claim a £50,000 reward after a nationwide hunt for the 'missing' child.
It's an aerial view of the interview, with a grainy picture, shot in the dingy back office of some cop shop, with the interviewing officers' faces blanked out and the suspect mumbling almost incoherently. Frankly, it's pretty dull, but the public appetite for crime is almost as great as that for celebrity it seems.
Can someone tell me the real value of putting this stuff up? Don't tell me it's freedom of information. I really don't need that kind of information. Is it the kind of entertainment value we get from watching reality TV? I'm serious - someone tell me.
I for one, would prefer to watch Horatio beat down his suspects in the neon colours of CSI Miami, than the grim reality of some sad woman in a grubby police station who I can't even see or hear properly.
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