Data for the study came from a 1997 survey of 2,250 Florida residents. Local crime rates, victim experience, and perceived realism of crime news operationalize the reality of crime and were included in ordinary least squares (OLS) estimates of the television news and fear of crime relationship. These measures of reality were also used as contexts for disaggregating the analysis. Local and national news were related to fear of crime independent of the effects of the reality of crime and other controls. Local news effects were stronger, especially for people who lived in high-crime areas or had recent victim experience. This contextual pattern of findings is consistent with a conclusion that television news is most influential when it reflects the experience or crime reality of respondents. With regard to fear, the most consequential of the messages about crime are received from local news, and the volume of crime stories in that medium has achieved proportions that concern many cities. For people who live in high-crime areas or who have recent victim experience, the quantity of such news may be another form of victimization, a by-product of the drive for ratings and revenues in an increasingly competitive industry that shows little sign of abating. Notes, tables, references