March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

The juvenile games we choose to play

Any day now in these increasingly touchy-feely and litigious times I expect to read something like this in the daily newspaper: “Authorities refused to release the name of the goalie who allowed the winning goal in the Holbrook School’s 3-2 overtime loss to Garland Street Junior High, citing confidentiality rules regarding juveniles…”

That is how ludicrous things are becoming as ultra-cautious officialdom, spooked by the confidentiality provisions of the state’s comprehensive juvenile code and apparently not really sure when it should be invoked and when it should not, play things safe.

Not wishing to get burned in a lawsuit for being the one accused of divulging the name of a juvenile defendant in a court case, cops, educators and assorted petty bureaucrats seem increasingly to take the position that anything involving juveniles — short of being named to the high school honor roll or being praised for helping a little blue-haired old lady across the street in rush-hour traffic — is off-limits to the press, and, by extension, the public. As a result, the public is treated to media reporting that, at times, seems whacky.

An Associated Press news story out of The Other Maine earlier this week is a case in point. The story identified a 14-year-old girl who was struck and killed by a motor vehicle while walking with her 16-year-old sister near their home. Police investigating the accident released the name of the accident victim, but refused to release the name of her sister, “citing confidentiality rules regarding juveniles,” according to The Associated Press.

Well, duh…

One didn’t need to be a Sherlock Holmes to deduce that, confidentiality-wise, the cat was pretty much out of the bag on this deal. Everyone in town undoubtedly knew the name of the surviving sister. And anyone else reading the story in the newspaper or hearing of the tragedy on television or radio learned that she is the 16-year-old sibling of the deceased. So what did withholding the name of the 16-year-old accomplish, other than to make authorities look a little silly?

Ask the police that question and they likely would tell you that their hands are tied by the confidentiality law — that, as a witness to the accident, the surviving sister’s observations became part of a police report which cannot be released to the public because the girl is a juvenile.

If you buy that, I have a question for you. What, then, do you make of another fatal accident in mid-coastal Maine just three days later, ironically also involving a 14-year-old and his 16-year-old brother? The younger boy was a passenger in a vehicle, driven by his older sibling, that left the road and rolled over. The survivor most assuredly was the subject of a police report, but police in that case had no qualms about releasing the names of both juveniles.

If such consistent inconsistency confuses you, welcome to the club.

I took to the law books to see if I could confirm a long-held suspicion that, when it comes to the publication of juveniles’ names, we in the news media are often hornswoggled by an officialdom that hides behind the juvenile code primarily because it’s the easy way out, not to mention a swell chance to finesse nosy reporters.

Talk about setting off on your basic fool’s errand. A Philadelphia lawyer would be hard-pressed to wade through the hundreds of pages of the Maine juvenile code, its addendums, deletions, cross-references, switchbacks and hairpin turns, and come out of the experience still coherent.

And since I’m not, I didn’t. Consequently, I soon gave it up as a bad job, on the theory that absolutely no one would much care what I might find, one way or the other, and mankind would be far better served were I to spend my time in pursuit of the perfect approach shot to the 18th green at Bangor Muni.

So we’re back to Square One: When it comes to the publication of juveniles’ names in certain matters where authorities have been scared off by the specter of lawsuits, real or imagined, the news media will continue to legally publish the names if they can obtain them from non-official sources. As well, the cops and educators and petty bureaucrats will continue to legally bob and weave and play the dubious confidentiality card.

And in those cases where the former’s investigative prowess is outflanked by the latter’s stonewalling and obfuscation skills, a public wishing to get the picture will be left to connect the dots. It may be a silly, juvenile game. But, by God, it’s our game.

NEWS columnist Kent Ward lives in Winterport. His e-mail address is olddawg@bangornews.infi.net.


Have feedback? Want to know more? Send us ideas for follow-up stories.

comments for this post are closed

You may also like