Shame on Chicago
Ian | 6/22/2005 | 8:19 am
Living in Chicago I often get the impression that city officials really don’t think things out very clearly but this is a little beyond the normal level of governmental short sightedness.
Chicago police are now publishing the names, photos, and addresses of accused prostitute patrons on a city web site specifically intended to embarrass and humiliate them.
Wow. Can we say lawsuit-waiting-to-happen? I’m all for the publicizing of criminal records but these guys haven’t even been to trial let alone been convicted. This is a clear violation of both the 8th and 5th amendments to the bill of rights and someone’s gonna get kicked in the nuts for it (metaphorically of course).
I hope the city’s lawyers are ready to rumble.
Published in Current Events and Politics
It makes me uncomfortable, too, but aren’t arrests a matter of public record? And criminal trials are public events with no provision to protect defendants from embarrassment or ridicule, right? It does seem to me that the intent of the site is to shame these people before they’ve been found guilty, but since the site carefully identifies them as having been accused and not (yet) convicted, are there really legal grounds to challenge it?