What am I missing? Isn’t her ID confidential?
I was going to say “not if she’s being charged as an adult,” but I noticed at the bottom of the story that prosecutors hadn’t yet decided how to charge her, so all I can say is that around here, her name wouldn’t be released until she were formally charged as an adult.
I’m not aware of any laws forcing news agencies to keep suspects names confidential regardless of their age. In fact I’m not aware of any laws that force news agencies to keep victims identities confidential regardless of age. Of cource LEA’s may be required to keep them confidential, but news agencies are not bound by such confidentiality, although there normally is a common courtesy practice regarding underage and sexual assault victims.
The level of detail in the original storyis surprising to me. Clearly the investigators are doing a lot of “sharing”, if you will. Also, in juvenile court/arraignment court photographers don’t have access to defendants in most jurisdictions I thought.
The way the story is written makes it seem that the Polk County authorities had no qualms about IDing the girl. It all seems odd given there hasn’t been any decision about whether to try her as an adult or juvenile.
“Now, it’s illegal to televise court proceedings in this state, so we’ll have to be quiet…[door slams in his face] D’oh!”
The infomation and picture all comes from the press release, which isn’t at all unusual. (HuffPo doesn’t do any actual reporting.. they just “repurpose” content.)
There is no law that I’m aware of requires sealing the identity of juveniles who have been arrested, or the fact that they have been arrested.
Some media outlets chose not to do this, but the ones I’ve worked for would a) not protect the identity of someone charged with murder and b) not protect the identity of someone the police have publicly identified.
As far as photographers in court, that varies from court room to court room at the discretion of the judge. Nothing about the coverage of this story is at all unusual.
IANAL, but I believe that Canada aggressively protects the identities of juveniles and this sort of disclosure would be against the law. Again, I don’t know the actual law, but I vaguely recall discussion around this subject. I’m sure more knowledgeable dopers will chime in.
That’s weird. I read about this story earlier on CNN.com and they didn’t identify the girl and they had blurred out a picture of her face.
I am of a mind that regardless of what crime a child is accused of, they are still a child and should have their identity protected, at least until the outcome of the trial.
You can review this case. As it deals with Homicide, the SC affixed thier hand to publication of a Juvenile’s name. It is my bet most police agencies will voluntarily limit any full name expect for crimes where the person can be charged as an adult OR, they are restricted by law.
In Ohio, a juvenile can be tried as an adult for murder when they are 14. Of course the Juvenile Court must decide that, not the Prosecutor. They can move to bind a person over, but the Judge is the final arbiter.
If I read the decision right, even though the crime was homicide, states can NOT restrict a media outlet from releasing a Juvenils name for any crime.
I checked the Ohio Rules of Juvenile Procedure and all I could find only concerned the courts;
RULE 5. Use of juvenile’s initials.
(A) In a juvenile court decision submitted for publication, the names of all juveniles shall be replaced with initials in the caption and body of the published decision. In any press release or other public presentation of information from a juvenile court, the names of any juvenile shall be replaced with initials.
(B) Juvenile courts may enact local rules for the use of juveniles’ initials in juvenile court documents. In the absence of a local rule, all juvenile court pleadings and other documents filed in any juvenile court shall use the full names of juveniles rather than their initials.
You see this alot, as in New Jersey v. TLO, as SC case where a student/juvenile was busted for possession, this is a seminal case for school search mandates.