To the editor:
Joseph Bauman's article "Chinks in gravity of courtroom let color - even humor - shine" on the Singer-Swapp trial was insensitive, tacky, and insulting.Now, for instance, is it funny that Addam Swapp wore a jacket with a flag similar to the one flown over the compound in a seige that ended in the death of our brother Fred House?
Mr. Bauman said that polygamists were on one side of the courtroom and reporters lined the other. He missed the fact that people who cared about Fred were present, too.
If Mr. Bauman would have looked closer he would have seen - seated next to him on occasion - Fred's sister Dawn. Still, what's funny about who was present at the trial?
Perhaps the reporter is obsessed with the Singer-Swapp clan and their antics. In another story about the trial, Mr. Bauman named our brother as "Corrections Lt. Fred Swapp."
Finding humor and color in a bizarre clan choked with hate and arrogance, defying the law and delighting in death is beyond comprehension. In short, the article was a misguided attempt to find comedy in a situation that by definition was devoid of it.
Dawn (House) Tracy
Gary House
Salt Lake City