David Carradine’s death — a few thoughts on media coverage

A few thoughts about David Carradine’s death and the subsequent media coverage:

• The image supposedly showing Carradine’s body in his hotel room
  As theories about the cause of Carradine’s death evolved from suicide to auto-erotic asphyxiation, a key element in the public’s perception of the case, it seems, was the surfacing of a photo that supposedly shows Carradine’s body in his hotel room. In the image, which is digitally altered to obscure the face and much of the body, a man is shown hanging in a closet, with his hands bound above his head.

  Thai tabloid newspaper Thai Rath published the image two days after Carradine was found dead, and many assume the photo is authentic. (I will not link to it here.) Others, however, aren’t so sure about the image’s provenance. As Andrew at the Thai media blog Bangkok Bugle points out:

  The upmarket Nai Lert Park hotel where Carradine’s body was found is refusing to confirm or deny if the image depicts one of their suites. Thai Rath remains equally silent about its sources, as does the Royal Thai Police about whether this image is genuine.

  Thailand’s most popular newspaper has been branded “sick” and “sensationalist” for its decision to publish the pictures on Saturday, however to those in Thailand their coverage is nothing out of the ordinary. Yesterday’s front page, for example, showed blood-spattered bodies from the latest terror attack in the south of the Kingdom.

  Regardless of this particular photo’s authenticity, there’s a bigger issue here: Thai Rath and other newspapers in Thailand are known for their graphic coverage. As Patrick Winn noted last month in GlobalPost:

  Each morning, Thailand’s newspaper racks offer a gallery of gore.

  Few days pass without a corpse, face-down and blood-soaked, appearing on Thai newspapers’ front pages. Equally common are accident scenes, with unlucky drivers spilling lifelessly from their totaled cars.

• Backlash in the Thai English language media
  There’s been some backlash in the Thai English-language papers. On Wednesday, the Nation ran this opinion piece, called “Sorry, David, if we are denying you peace.” The author explains the paper’s approach to covering the story. And yesterday’s Bangkok Post has this item, “Shocking pix need a call for moral outrage.”
• International coverage
  News of Carradine’s death has made headlines the world over, not just in Thailand, of course. Al Tompkins has a post at the journalism site PoynterOnline called “Why You Shouldn’t Publish Alleged Carradine Death Photos.” An excerpt:

  Thai Rath, a newspaper in Thailand, has published a front-page photo of what it says is David Carradine’s body hanging by ropes in a hotel closet. The actor was found dead in a Bangkok hotel last week.

  No doubt, the grisly photo, as well as an autopsy photo that’s been surfacing across the Web, will generate lots of traffic.

  But they’re not news.

  It’s right to wonder whether they’re authentic, but even if they are, I can’t imagine a legitimate reason to publish them.

• New details and the ongoing investigation
  Meanwhile, details about Carradine’s death are still emerging: A forensics expert hired by the actor’s family has now examined Carradine’s body in the US. As the AP recently reported, the expert says Carradine’s death was not a suicide, though he cautioned that a final cause of death can’t be determined at this point. The results of ongoing Thai forensics tests should be known in a matter of weeks.