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http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wqcs/local-wqcs-978944.mp3
Fort Pierce, FL – This is the kind of publicity Port St. Lucie can do without. Seventeen-year-old Tyler Hadley was charged with second-degree murder in the death of his parents Blake and Mary Jo Hadley. They were bludgeoned with a hammer. Police say the teen hosted a party after his parents were killed. An invitation was posted on Facebook. Some 50 to 60 people came while the dead couple lay on the floor in the locked bedroom. The lurid story put Port St. Lucie in the news around the world. Port St. Lucie police fielded telephone calls from the Associated Press, more than a dozen major newspapers and the Nancy Grace Show on the HLN cable channel. TV vans were parked near the house. Mark Potter of NBC News was there to file a report for the "Today" show. The Port St. Lucie double murder was given big play on the all-news cable channels. It was featured on the web sites of People magazine, the Daily Mail of London and publications as far away as Norway and Australia. It would be nice if the media came back to Port St. Lucie and did stories about biotech research at the Tradition Center for Innovation, or animation-movie making at Digital Domain, or the four college branches. But they won't. To them, that's not news. For 88.9 FM, this is Paul Janensch.
Treasure Coast essayist Paul Janensch was a newspaper editor and taught journalism at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut.