Some newspapers, with radically reduced staffs unable to follow up on the disposition of cases, are dropping names from their police blotters for lesser crimes. They still report the crimes so that readers will know the areas involved.
The late State Desk Editor, Pat Englehart, made it a
point for his staff to keep track of every crime reported in the BJ and to
check regularly on the disposition of the case. He felt it was unfair to name a
person at the time of his arrest or indictment, then not notify the BJ readers
if the case were dropped or the person were found innocent.
But it was
impossible to follow every arrest reported and let the BJ readers know how it
turned out because it often takes months from arrest to resolution.
The University of Connecticut and University of Miami
at Oxford, Ohio student newspapers have stopped naming those arrested for lesser crimes.
Technology and Google and the social media
have greatly expanded the problem.
The names of those arrested remain out there
forever, but the disposition often doesn’t show up in the search. So a person
found innocent or having the charges dropped or reduced shows up on Google the
same as the person found guilty. And Google searchers don’t know how the cases
turned out.
Worse, potential employers – who more and
more use social media to check on prospective employees – see the arrest but
not the disposition.
Mainstream papers such as the Palm Beach, Florida Post
and the Chattanooga, Tennessee Free Press and Times continue to publish names
of those arrested.
To read Gail Macdonald’s entire article, click on http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/top-stories/235493/college-papers-dropping-arrestee-names-from-crime-blotters/
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