Frankly, I'm Ashamed

This weekend should have been fairly routine. Diane and I headed up to see her mother in Michigan, recovering from some pretty serious health issues. The newsroom seemed in good hands with plans to cover the Road Runner Marathon, Akron's farewell to Rex Humbard, the Indians on a playoff roll and the Browns looking to beat the Ravens. What's to go wrong?

Plenty.

Monday afternoon I got an e-mail and phone message from Laurie Cramer at the Prosecutor's Office, but because of tasks on my schedule for today didn't get a chance to see until late in the day she was alerting me to our story coverage last week where we dropped the ball.

Some of you have been following the coverage of the Tayse trial, the story of the Pennsylvania man charged with abducting and assaulting a Pittsburgh-area mother and her daughter before releasing them here in Ohio. He was found guilty. They were hoping for justice in Summit County, where Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh personally handled presenting the state's case of crimes that crossed state lines.

As you'll see in our AkronNewsNow story, edited earlier this afternoon, the names of the victims of this horrible crime were included in our original coverage. Not only did we make this mistake on Thursday of last week when the trial first went to the jury, but we also repeated the error on Friday. There is no excuse.

We've since removed the names because as a matter of policy we don't normally report the ID of victims of sex crimes, especially when it involves children. In fact, the only time I remember identifying the victims of sexual assault locally was the Denny Ross rape case a few years ago, and that was only because the victim insisted upon it. My personal and professional view is that we should never report the name of the victim unless it is by prior consent or, as in the Duke lacrosse allegations case, the charges are found to be without merit by clear and convincing evidence and the accuser becomes the accused. We've had such discussions on numerous occasions in the newsroom, usually in the coverage of high-profile cases but also in coverage of other, less headline-grabbing accounts.

We failed in our coverage of the Tayse trial, and worse we failed to correct our actions in a timely and professional manner when it was brought to our attention. When the Prosecutor's office first called to alert us the victims found their names in our coverage, we should have acted immediately to correct our story and apologize; instead, we left the issue in voicemail for another day.

I contacted Laurie and apologized for our original coverage; I apologized for our failure to appropriately edit the coverage on multiple levels; and I apologized for the lack of a response deserved by not only the Prosecutor but also the victims in this crime. They were victims of our actions and our inaction, and there is no excuse. We can apologize, but that will not repair the damage.

It isn't against the law to identify victims of crime, nor do I think it should be. Many times reporting the news is an ugly business, but making these decisions should be a constant subject of debate in every newsroom. News departments will fashion their own policies according to their own ethics and standards, and news consumers will make the ultimate judgment on whether those organizations earned their trust and respect.

We all work hard toward that goal, but there are times when we don't work hard enough. The problem isn't when we worry about what we do but when we don't worry about why; in this case we didn't protect a family in Pennsylvania who deserved better, we didn't serve our audience who should expect higher standards and we weren't true to our own sense of personal values that should drive us to question why, especially when that question is turned to ourselves.

We apologize on all counts.