Not Your Gramma's Grammar

[Joel S. Berson]

[Original in NYTimes:]

Jacob Rivera, 15, near his apartment in the Bronx, who was convicted
of assault, receives intensive therapy as part of his new
sentence.  [136 characters with spaces.]

[Proposed by David A. Daniel:]

Jacob Rivera, 15, pictured near his Bronx apartment, receives therapy
as part of his sentence for assault.  [106 characters with spaces.]

[The above leaves out both "intensive" and "new".]

Jacob Rivera, 15, pictured near his Bronx apartment, receives
intensive therapy as part of his new sentence for assault.  [120
characters with spaces.]

[Still, the above can be read as though Rivera has been sentenced for
a recent crime, not his first.  Rather, the significant element of
the piece is that he was re-sentenced for his previous
conviction.  The article and picture can be seen at NYTimes
on-line.  The headline there is "A Home Remedy for Juvenile
Offenders".  The article begins:

"When Jacob Rivera, 15, was resentenced in May on an assault
conviction, he felt he had received a 'blessing.'

"Only months earlier he had been sentenced to a year in state
custody, and he had already spent weeks bouncing between a juvenile
detention center in the Bronx and a residential treatment campus upstate."

Joel

At 2/23/2008 05:31 AM, David A. Daniel wrote:
>Jacob Rivera, 15, pictured near his Bronx apartment, receives therapy as
>part of his sentence for assault.
>17 words/106 characters with spaces
>
>The previous sentences offered (below) all read as if he is getting therapy
>somewhere near his apartment in the Bronx. Not so. The therapist goes to
>Jacob's apartment. And, in newspaperese, they would tend to indicate that
>the picture is showing Jacob receiving therapy. Above is shorter, too.
>DAD
>
>
> >As part of his new sentence for assault, Jacob Rivera, 15, receives
>intensive therapy near his apartment in the Bronx."
>
> >Jacob Rivera, 15, who was convicted of assault, receives intensive
>therapy near his Bronx apartment as part of his sentence.
>
> >Better:  Fifteen-year-old Jacob Rivera, who was convicted of assault,
>receives intensive therapy near his Bronx apartment as part of his
>sentence.
>
> >The first of the above two versions runs to 20 words and 123 characters,
>including spaces.
>The second runs to 20 words and 136 characters including spaces.
>
>The original: 23 words, 135 spaces.
>
>My second version could be reduced to a shorter character count by
>replacing 'receives' with 'gets', without substantially altering the
>meaning. If space were really an issue, you could parse the sentence
>a bit more (without altering the meaning) by eliminating 'who was'.
>
>OK?
>dh
>
>
>Please write the complete sentence, as one sentence, starting it
>with  "Jacob Rivera, 15, who was convicted..."  Including the apartment.
>Joel
>
> >"Twice removed"? You have a problem with
> >   "Jacob Rivera, 15, who was convicted..."
> >?
> >
> >m a m
> >
> >On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 10:16 PM, Doug Harris <cats22 at frontiernet.net>
> >wrote:
> >
> > > A cut line (photo caption) on the front page of the NY/Region of today's
> > > NY Times:
> > > >Jacob Rivera, 15, near his apartment in the Bronx, who was convicted of
> > > assault, receives intensive therapy as part of his new sentence.<
> > > ---
> > > The topic of typos has arisen here again recently. Many such, as
> > > has been noted, can be excused by time and other pressures. It's
> > > not so easy, though, to 'justify' subject-object twice (by commas)
>removed
> > > disasters such as this one.
>
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>
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