Why Is the Media Lying About Crime?

By John Friend

Two recent incidents, one of which garnered massive media coverage while the other barely registered on the national media’s radar, underscore how dishonest and politicized the corporate news media is when it comes to reporting on crime, particularly crime involving suspects and victims of differing racial backgrounds.

If the perpetrator happens to be white and the victim black, the purported crime dominates headlines and is endlessly analyzed and discussed by “trusted experts” who often happen to have an anti-white racial animus and who promote a biased, leftist narrative emphasizing “systemic racism” and “white supremacy.” If, on the other hand, the perpetrator is black and the victim white, the incident is hardly covered, and the facts involved are downplayed and ignored.

This reality was demonstrated in recent weeks by two separate incidents, one in Kansas City involving an elderly white homeowner and a black high school student and another in North Carolina involving a white family and a black neighbor.

On Thursday, April 13, Ralph Yarl, a 16-year-old high school student in Kansas City, approached the home of 84-year-old Andrew Lester. Yarl, a junior at Stanley High School, was reportedly attempting to pick up his younger twin brothers that evening but went to the wrong house, apparently mistaking Lester’s home for the residence where he was supposed to pick up his brothers.

Yarl knocked on the door at roughly 9 p.m. that evening, which startled and awoke Lester, who lives alone and was sleeping. Lester armed himself with a .32 caliber revolver and approached the front door, unsure of who was there. In statements to police, Lester explained that he thought someone was attempting to break into his house.

According to reports, Lester allegedly opened the door and fired two shots, striking Yarl twice, wounding the teen in the left forehead and right arm. Lester later told investigating officers that he was “scared to death” because of Yarl’s size and age, and that shooting was “the last thing he wanted to do.”

“He stated he believed someone was attempting to break into the house and shot twice (through an exterior storm door) within a few seconds of opening the [main] door,” a police detective wrote in a report detailing the incident, while also noting that Lester expressed concern for Yarl following the shooting.

Yarl fled Lester’s home immediately after the shooting, asking nearby residents to call police. Police responded at 9:52 p.m., finding Yarl at a neighbor’s house. Lester was cooperative, allowing police to search his residence, and was taken into custody that evening before being released at 1:30 a.m. the following morning.

That weekend, protesters marched through Lester’s neighborhood demanding charges be brought against the startled homeowner, who, according to self-defense attorney Andrew Branca, had not broken Missouri state law.

Branca stated in a recent video analysis of the situation he conducted for his popular YouTube program “Law of Self Defense” that: “Any shots fired while Yarl was upright and apparently attempting to unlawfully enter Lester’s dwelling … were almost certainly lawful under Missouri law.”

Following public outcry and a protest outside Lester’s home, in addition to demands by special interest groups and race-hustling lawyers, Clay County prosecuting attorney Zachary Thompson announced charges against Lester, who stands accused of assault in the first degree and armed criminal action which, if found guilty, would result in a life sentence for the 84-year-old retiree.

“I can tell you there was a racial component to this case,” Thompson stated at a news conference announcing the charges, without elaborating or providing the slightest bit of evidence to support that contention.

Faith Spoonmore, a relative of Yarl, quickly organized a GoFundMe page to raise money for Yarl, which was promoted and shared by numerous high-profile celebrities on social media. The GoFundMe has raised nearly $3.5 million as AFP goes to press, which will be used for Yarl’s “medical bills and therapy” as well as “college expenses at Texas A&M, a trip to West Africa, and other expenses,” according to the fundraising site.

The day after prosecutors announced charges against Lester, a 24-year-old black man, who was previously freed on bond stemming from a brutal sledgehammer attack on his then-girlfriend, shot three family members in North Carolina, including a six-year-old white girl, after a basketball rolled into his yard.

Over 10 kids were playing basketball and riding their bikes in a neighborhood in Gastonia, N.C. on April 18, when Robert Louis Singletary, the shooter, opened fire on Jamie White, his wife, and six-year-old daughter, Kinsley, striking each of them.

According to local reports, after the basketball rolled into his yard, Singletary approached White and said “You white? I don’t even like white people. I’m going to shoot your a**,” before opening fire on the young family. While Singletary has been arrested, the national news media has largely ignored the story and has not reported on the racial nature of the crime, a clear indication of the anti-white bias on full display in the news media. The national news media has, in fact, almost completely censored the story. It is unclear if the clearly anti-white statements made by Singletary will factor into his prosecution.

The reality of crime and the racial dynamics involved in modern American society are heavily skewed and distorted by the mainstream corporate news media. Leftist narratives promoting the manufactured notion of “white supremacy” and “systemic racism” dominating society and oppressing minorities are all that matter to the corporate titans controlling the airwaves, while the actual facts of black-on-white violent crime are downplayed or entirely ignored.