This study explores how South African television news reports communicate on sentence proceedings criminal cases involving violent acts against children. These kinds of crimes tend to attract public interest, and the outcomes can be a litmus test on the community's views concerning the justice system. By using cluster criticism to consider the discursive and non-discursive components of selected news reports, the study considers how television news broadcasts use factual and evaluative language and visuals when communicating court outcomes. The paper argues that these broadcasters tend to use evaluative language and visuals, as opposed to factual terms. This tendency can prevent news media from playing the educative role envisaged in the principle of open justice because instead of emphasising the factual aspects of sentencing proceeding, these reports focus on the outcome and the emotive aspects of the cases that entertain rather than educate.

这项研究探讨了南非电视新闻报道如何就涉及暴力侵害儿童行为的刑事案件在判决程序中进行交流。这类犯罪往往会引起公众的关注，其结果可能是对社区有关司法制度观点的试金石。通过使用群集批评来考虑选定新闻报道的话语和非话语成分，该研究考虑了电视新闻广播在传达法院结果时如何使用事实性和评估性语言和视觉效果。该论文认为，这些广播公司倾向于使用评价性语言和视觉效果，而不是事实术语。这种趋势可能会阻止新闻媒体发挥公开司法原则所设想的教育作用，因为它没有强调判决程序的事实方面，