This week there was another case in court that has me musing over the issue of public interest versus interesting to the public.
Whenever I encounter a borderline case, I end up with the question am I publishing because I should publish or just because I want to or just because it’s a slow news week?
In some ways, this case is the kind of story we routinely cover because it involves an assault and uttering threats.
On the other hand, it is the kind of story we routinely don’t cover because it was a relatively minor incident related to a personal dispute between two people with a fairly close relationship.
It did happen in public, though, and there are some aspects to it that were certainly interesting to me, and probably would be to our readers.
But we are in the business of journalism, and interesting is not necessarily the litmus test for newsworthy.
It would be newsworthy if the man posed a threat to the general public. It would be newsworthy if the Court was somehow negligent in its duty to serve the public interest. It would be newsworthy if the man had been sentenced to prison time. It would be newsworthy if the man was a public figure. It would be newsworthy if the victim was a public figure. It would be newsworthy if the victim had been seriously injured.
None of these things apply, however.
In a nutshell, the accused was the landlord to the complainant. There was some dispute over a damage deposit, an improperly terminated lease and some ongoing issue about cable television and an alleged case of identity theft that were vaguely referred to during the sentencing hearing.
The two men happened to run into each other while one was leaving a local business and the other was arriving. Exchanged words turned into a heated confrontation and the defendant pushed the plaintiff into a rack and threatened to “kill” or to “drill” him depending on whether you believe the Crown or defence.
The judge, in a fit of judicial balance, since the actual wording of the threat was not going to change the outcome of the sentencing, suggested modifying the information to be sufficiently vague as to satisfy both parties.
The man, who at 51 years of age has never before been in trouble with the law, pleaded guilty to both counts.
At issue in the nature of the sentence was the man’s active 30-year career with a company that requires periodic, clean criminal record checks.
Both the circumstances of the crime and the personal circumstances of the accused are a classic case for a conditional discharge. The ultimate test for this is whether it is in the best interest of the accused and not contrary to the public interest.
A condition discharge was the recommendation of a joint submission, which was accepted by the Court.
Now, if the Crown and defence and a provincial court judge can agree that it is not contrary to the public interest to impose a conditional discharge, who am I to disagree.
I don’t disagree. It was the right thing to do and hence, it really is of borderline newsworthiness considering my aforementioned criteria.
However, the public interest in the sense the court uses it is a little different than how we use it in the media. The public certainly has a right to know about cases where people have run afoul of the law and we would certainly be well within our rights to run the story.
This guy did plead guilty to assault and uttering threats in open court, after all. And the proceedings of the court are public information.
Nevertheless, the Court saw fit not to destroy his career by imposing a suspended or custodial sentence.
I do not know if publishing his name would destroy his career. I would think not because it would have been very unwise of him not to tell his employer he was going through this. And the job requires a clean criminal record check not a clean Google search.
I think it’s safe to say, however, that not having his name splashed across the front page of a newspaper is probably in his best interest. Which leaves only the question of whether or not I think it is contrary to the public interest not to publish it.
And so, I have done what I sometimes do in these borderline cases. I have compromised by not publishing it as a news story, but writing about it here in my Crime Diary.
Most of the facts are there among my philosophical musings, but I have omitted the names of the players. Those who want more can come to court, which is always open to the public.
