Sylvia Woodard's letter, "Carr shouldn't ask public to help pay legal costs" (March 30), prompted me to write about something that has bothered me since Casey Bokhoven's death occurred.

The death is a tragedy: certainly to the young man who died; to Tolly Carr, whom I admired for his youth and freshness on the news and whose career and life are now ruined; to their families and friends.

At the same time, I could not help but think of the deference shown to Carr by the print and electronic media to a member of their own, and compare to other coverage of "celebrities." Anna Nicole Smith, a trash story from the beginning, filled more than 70 percent of the television talk show coverage for several days, and it continues on a lesser scale weeks after her death. Sidney Lowe II, the son of a prominent basketball coach and a local student, is a story of local interest deserving of an initial report and a follow-up, but there have been six or seven stories in the News & Record since his arrest.

The absence of reporters thrusting TV microphones or pad and pen in Carr's face day after day says much, all bad, about the quality, independence and professionalism of today's journalists.

Jerry S. Weston
Greensboro