From NewsTimes.com this morning:

“Metro-North Spokesperson Dan Brucker said a train that left the Danbury station at 6:19 a.m killed the “trespasser”. The trespasser appears to be a woman, Brucker said.”

From The Republican-American, November 11th, 2005:

“…was the eighth “trespasser death” in 2005 on the Metro-North system, which is made up of the Hudson, Harlem and New Haven lines, Bruckner said. …”

Connecticut Post, April 12, 2008:

“The train struck a trespasser east of Stratford” at 4:40 pm, said Karina Romero, an Amtrak spokeswoman.”

January 12, 2009 Star-Ledger:

A man was struck and killed by an eastbound NJ Transit train at the Linden station late this afternoon, and transit officials are calling it a “trespasser fatality.”

NJ Transit spokesman Dan Stessel said the man had apparently “put himself into the side of the train,”

Listen, MTA, we know that you have rightfully have legal liability concerns with one of your trains striking and killing a human being.

As such, we also understand why you would want to make it abundantly and immediately clear that the victim was not supposed to be where they were at the time. I mean, we ALL know that, and we know how much you want to assert that to the victim’s survivors.

But let’s show a little more respect to the victim, family, and community by not referring to them primarily as ‘trespassers’. Seriously, this is in VERY bad taste, and its not like its purpose or insensitivity is lost on the reader of any paper.

Everytime I hear this, I picture a cartoon of an Old West farmer, standing over the dead body of some chicken thief with a smoking shotgun.

I think I speak for most people when I say its an egregiously offensive piece of CYA.

Not to mention unnecessary. If the victim trespassed, well, she trespassed. If a lawsuit were to arise, that fact would not change one way or the other depending on your press department’s assertion to local papers.

It’s really just a sad Jedi mind trick to dispel any notion of liability in the minds of the victim’s survivors.

Today a woman deliberately ‘trespassed’ on MTA property and laid her body down before a moving train in South Norwalk, much to the horror of witnesses, riders, emergency responders, and the engineer, I am sure.

That woman is a ‘victim’. I know it pains you to characterize her as such, to avoid the unwarranted deduction that she was a victim of MTA. She wasn’t. She was likely a victim of her own actions, and whatever unfortunate circumstances led her to those tracks.

How you choose to characterize that woman in the press release is important.

Granted, you aren’t the only culprit, and its seems pretty much the industry norm to put the trespass status of train accident victims up front. But its still a choice, and its one you continue to make.

Next time, let’s release a statement which primarily reflects on the unfortunate and solemn mood such occasions present, and not let ‘calling shotgun’ on your legal defense define the moment.

PS – As an aside, I don’t want to specifically call out Dan Brucker or any other press spokesman for this behavior, because I am absolutely certain it is in no way their personal preference to use that word, but instead an unfortunate requirement of their employer. I understand that press spokespeople are human beings too.