A promising young student is slain by a stray bullet as she walks near campus. A beloved grandmother is robbed of $2 and killed just after she unlocks the laundromat her family has operated for 15 years. A homeowner mowing his lawn in the afternoon is accosted and shot.

There is little that is scarier than random, unpredictable crime committed by a stranger in broad daylight.

As much as we try to stay safe, the high-profile crimes we’ve seen lately shatter the illusion that we can protect ourselves.

Atlanta police continue to stress that violent crime is down. It’s not surprising that residents are angry and mistrustful. They don’t find the assurances particularly reassuring.

The Atlanta-Journal-Constitution is helping readers arm themselves with information about the latest crime reports in their area.

The new crime data collection is a work in progress but you can see the page at www.ajc.com/go/crimereports.

The page includes recent crime reports from several local …

Shawn McIntosh, Public editor

The health care debate isn’t just filling up the airwaves with pundits and the town hall meetings with concerned citizens.

It’s also filling up my inbox.

Communication to the public editor ebbs and flows from week to week. It jumps when editors make changes to the newspaper. And it spikes whenever proofreaders miss a stupid mistake, like one recent article that said a Civil War battle occurred in 1983.

Lately there’s been a steady increase in the number of calls and e-mails that include questions about various health care proposals, concern and criticism about media coverage, and suggestions for stories the newspaper should tackle.

The comments include a wide range of opinion, from both supporters and opponents of the current health care proposals. They also include a few consistent themes I’ve shared with newsroom editors:

Readers on all sides of the debate resent being painted with a broad brush. They say they are not racists, …

Shawn McIntosh, Public editor

[Thanks for all the feedback. Commenting on this post has ended for now. See what others said below this note and join Managing editor Bert Roughton on Sunday, April 26, when he will respond to comments and questions.]

This week I became the AJC’s new public editor. Let me introduce myself and my role.

I’m a career newswoman who has worked at newspapers all over the South. I once worked in a nice office overlooking the Potomac, but my accent just didn’t fit in. Atlanta is my favorite home so far.

I have a passion for news and believe the watchdog role newspapers play is vital to democracy. It is the reason the Founding Fathers protected the independence of a free press. Now that the press has gone digital, and a multi-million-dollar warehouse of steel is not required to publish, audiences have more opportunity than ever to shape journalism. Every connected citizen can contribute to news coverage and participate in community conversation. I …