Of life and death
Photos capture woman's last moments
The drowning of an emotionally-troubled woman created questions for a newspaper and the photographer who recorded the event.
By Julie Kredens, staff writer
"I thought I’d be photographing a rescue. Instead, I photographed a drowning."
On December 3, Lawrence (MA) Eagle-Tribune photographer Marc Halevi had gone to the shores of Plum Island to get shots of the stormy seas and the highest tides in 60 years. He ended up with a powerful collection of images recording the last moments of a woman’s life — and the Eagle-Tribune ended up with difficult decisions.
How should these photos of the death of an obviously disturbed woman be played? The victim had been drinking heavily that morning, according to witnesses at the beach, and saying things such as "let the ocean take me."
Publishing the photos would undoubtedly raise the question: Why didn’t the photographer jump in to try to save a drowning woman?
When Halevi first saw the woman she was standing on a sand bank dangerously near the stormy ocean. He snapped a picture, liking the idea of having a person in his shot. Seconds later as he was looking through his viewfinder, he saw a wave crash against the embankment on which she was standing, knocking down the sand and pulling the woman into the water.
Instinctively, Halevi snapped a photograph moments after she fell. He said he then shouted to nearby rescuers, who were already on the island because of the stormy weather conditions.
"Rather than do it myself," said Halevi, "I just made this immediate decision that (these people) would be better than I (at rescuing her)."
But because the sea was so rough, even a trained rescue team was unsuccessful. Halevi captured her futile attempt to reach a rescuer’s hand. Her body washed ashore three hours later.
Some news accounts labeled the death a suicide, but Halevi said his camera recorded a different story. "She definitely did not jump in, nor did she walk in," Halevi said, "but I think by being near the edge, she was doing something that could be construed as suicidal."
The newspaper never called the death a suicide. It did refer to the drowning of a "troubled woman" and quoted her neighbors as saying the victim had talked about suicide in the past.
Since it wasn’t suicide, in their opinion, city editor Alan White said there was never any question about whether to use the photographs but how. "She did try to get out," White said, and the power of the storm and the heroics of those who tried to save her made the incident a "story that needed to be told."
Drownings of people during these weather conditions are not uncommon, White said. "People go down to the beach to see this spectacle and some of them don’t come back." White said seven people drowned last year.
White said they also decided early on to explain in a sidebar piece the photographer’s involvement and his attempt to get help. In the cutline for the photo of the woman floating on her back, the Tribune also made a point of explaining that the shot was taken with a telephoto lens from fifty feet away to dispel the impression given by the photo that Halevi was within arm’s length of the victim.
Eagle-Tribune editor Dan Warner was also concerned the photo of the woman with the raised cigarette and bottle might not give an accurate story.
"She looks like she’s not struggling and she’s just floating away," said White. "It looks like Ophelia’s mad scene — holding a bottle of beer."
Halevi believes she was simply in a state of shock and said moments later she was struggling for her life.
Still shaken by the incident, Halevi wonders if it would have made a difference had he not taken the photograph when she slid into the water.
"One of the things that I have real problems with and I haven’t really resolved . . . perhaps, if I hadn’t taken the five or ten seconds, if I hadn’t responded to my instincts to first take the shot, perhaps that time would have (made) the difference between life and death."
But White believes Halevi made the right call. "There were professional rescuers there," White says, "They were trained . . . and had the equipment."
Source: FineLine: The Newsletter On Journalism Ethics, vol. 3, no. 1 (January 1991), p. 3.
This case was produced for FineLine, a publication of Billy Goat Strut Publishing, 600 East Main Street, Louisville, Kentucky 40202. Reprinted with the permission of Billy Goat Strut Publishing. This case may be reproduced for classroom and research purposes. Publication of this case in electronic or printed form requires written permission from the publisher and Indiana University. An exception is granted for use in readers designed for specific academic courses.
October 9th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
We think that the photographer should not be blamed for the incident involving the woman. He was just doing his job and the photo was taken 50 feet away, so it wasn’t like he could really help her. Also, since there were trained professional rescuers it was not his duty to save her. Even if he did attempt to save her, he would have been risking his own life.
October 9th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
We do not believe that the journalist did anything wrong when being in this position. There was nothing more that Halevi could have done, other than trying to get help from the rescuers..which he did. The few seconds it took for him to snap the photo would have not resulted any more positively due to the terrible storm that the place was already having. If trained profesionals could not have done anything more to save the ‘troubled woman’, then Halevi would have potentially been putting his life in more danger than it was already in.
October 9th, 2008 at 1:24 pm
The journalist, I believe, did NOT do anything wrong. Of course, he did just take pictures instead of trying to save her, but in otherwords the rescuers were doing their jobs, as so was he. Although this is a tragic event that someone drowned in the waters, it was fate that he ended up at the besch at the exact right time to take the picture. Her story must have needed to be told. If Haveli had jumped into the water to try and save, as an untrained lifeguard, he would have hurt himself more than trying to save her. He was already at risk being so closed to a stormy sea. At what measures do we take to capture a shot?
November 5th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
I don’t think that the journalist did anthing wrong. He even admited that he should have acted but that wasn’t his job and there were other people on the beach that it was their job to save the women. The reported also tested the accuracy of what he caught on film by talking to her peers they told him that she had talked about sucide in the past.
November 5th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
I think that the journalist did all that he could to save the woman, and he just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time taking pictures. He didn’t intend to be put on the spot by a drowning woman and he handled the situation in a professional way. The editor also noted under the photo that the journalist was not in arms length so people would not get a misunderstanding.
April 6th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
We don’t think that Halevi is to blame for the woman’s drowning. The fact that he was 50 ft. away shows how he was too far away to help her. Another point is that if a professional rescue team couldn’t save her then the chances that Halevi could have saved her is very small.
April 12th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
We think that because the journalist was not the only one there to save the woman, he was not wrong to stay and document the situation. Had he been the only person available to save the woman, and had taken pictures instead of trying to help the woman, that would have been a different situation.
May 28th, 2009 at 10:52 pm
I can understand that the photographer would be troubled, but he really couldn’t have done anything to help the woman. If he had gone in to save her, he would have died trying seeing as the water was too much for the rescuers. He wasn’t alone there, he wasn’t the only person there to help, so calling to professionals was the best choice; they were just doing their jobs, as was the photographer. I can also understand why it would be troubling to take the photos of the troubled woman’s last moments alive. They seem private, sacred, not meant to be documented. But it is his job as a photographer to depict the photos to go along with the story. The editor was right, the real problem is figuring out how to use them appropriately. Personally, I think they shouldn’t have used them at all. The article about the woman’s tragic drowning was disturbing enough without photo-documentation of her last breathes to go along with it.