[ajb257]

Whilst a free press is important, I would argue that 'a man and a woman have been held in connection with the Gatwick Airport drone incident' would suffice. Kudos to the BBC for recognising this.

It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. Publishing their names and pictures before _even being charged_ does nothing but open potentially innocent people up to danger.

Whoever caused the Gatwick chaos needs to be brought to justice, but this is beyond reckless

[DanBC]

> It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime.

The press always say that naming people who've been arrested is an important measure against authoritarian regimes. It allows the public to know whether police powers of arrest are being misused or not.

They appear to have lost this argument, because this is in tension with people's right to privacy and rights to a fair trial by the courts not by the media.

There's some interesting info here about different approaches: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/100634...

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/apr/21/press-intrusio...

[dbdjfjrjvebd]

There is a simple way to have both. Give people the right to anonymity and also give them personally the right to wave that right. This protects people both ways.

[vertexFarm]

This plan isn't thought through to its conclusion. If a government is willing to illegally detail political dissidents, etc. they will certainly not mind lying about that dissident's decision for anonymity.

Not like the KGB of old would tell a reporter the truth when they ask if the nameless detained man in a gulag somewhere requested his name be reported and let them blow open the fact that the government is arresting non-criminals for political purposes. I mean in that situation, Soviets already knew--it's not a perfect analogy. They'll just say he exercised his right to privacy.

It only works if the announcement of identity is public by default, unfortunately. Neither option is great at all, but I don't think I'm qualified to come up with a better plan.

[gruez]

>This protects people both ways.

Not really. If the cops want to drag you off and detain you secretly for indefinite amount of time (what the law is trying to prevent), then all they have to do is charge you with some embarrassing crime like "sex with underage minor", to force you to waive that right.

[YawningAngel]

This doesn't work in systems which punish trumped-up charges, which any reasonable system clearly should.

[hopler]

There is an obvious difference between protecting people by tracking their identities in captivity vs harming people by publicly shaming them by immediately parroting the authority'sallegations.

[caminante]

You're missing his point.

Your distinction still places the trust in the discretion of the police/press. If they don't disclose the name, then it's harder for character witnesses to come forward (e.g. the couple's neighbors in this case).

[TheOtherHobbes]

I don't think it works like that. Character witnesses are organised in private by a defence lawyer, who - of course - knows the identities of the accused. Not by a public announcement in the press.

Front page headlines along the lines of "The police believe these people are criminals who caused huge inconvenience and suffering to hundreds of thousands of people - would someone like to say a good work about them?" probably aren't the best way to guarantee a fair trial.

[caminante]

> Front page headlines [...] probably aren't the best way to guarantee a fair trial.

Again, this sub-thread's premise is that "naming people who've been arrested is an important measure against authoritarian regimes."

The point is, you wouldn't get a "fair trial" in an authoritarian society. Knowing whether you're in one is tough (It could be as low-level as local law enforcement.) Given these two points, it's a values-based argument that more information is better. That's all.

Of course, it's horrible when someone gets wrongfully accused. I don't know where the sweet spot is. I'm outsourcing much of my trust to other citizens.

[Carpetsmoker]

I would argue that publishing the names at all isn't particularly news-worthy. The right to privacy exists, too.

In the justice system it's the judge which rules a sentence. Years – or even decades – of public shaming doesn't seem fair to me. Committing a crime doesn't mean you're no longer dealing with a person with real feelings. Publishing names and photos strikes me as "2 minutes of hate", and not "news".

Also note that it doesn't just affect the person(s). Family members or even completely unrelated people with similar names can get threatened.

[starbeast]

Even just being in a crime reconstruction video as an actor is apparently risky. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-342183...

[hopler]

That's horrid. The BBC producers admitted they knew they were putting him in harm's way by republishit the video, and they intentionally went ahead anyway instead of taking a few minutes to fix the video.

[Carpetsmoker]

> Det Insp Helen Evans, of Lincolnshire Police, said it would be "remiss not to thoroughly investigate every solid piece of information" and he will be given an update "in due course".

I will never seize to be amazed at the capacity of some people to not think for themselves.

[jacquesm]

That's one very effective way to get people to no longer want to act in reconstruction videos.

[closeparen]

The facts entering public record are what distinguishes "arrested" from "disappeared."

Do you want to live in a world where people are yanked off the street and not heard of for months or years, with no ability for the press/friends/family to find out about the situation, "out of respect for their privacy?"

If the police refuse to disclose whether they've grabbed someone, I'm going to assume I'm in Soviet Russia.

[ljm]

But, the police can disclose that information without expecting newspapers to slap it on the front page.

The court of public opinion is utterly unforgiving compared to the legal system these people could be sent through. We're not talking about neighbours reading an outrage piece in their daily paper; we're talking about nutjobs on the internet finding their Facebook profiles, their Twitter accounts, their emails, their physical addresses, and then doing their best to make those people's lives hell. Because that's what happens and the mob operates on a hair trigger.

The number of people being truly disappeared in our Western societies is vanishingly small, compared to all of the people who have their mugshots and criminal records indexed on Google, and all of the people who were indicted by newspaper editors before a jury even got a chance. That's before the internet keyboard warriors start shipping out their death threats or fabricating hostage situations for SWAT teams.

[mattmanser]

While it's not clear, the NYT seems to be saying that the local MP (politician) accidentally named them thinking the police had made them public, while the police would not confirm them and never named them.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/22/world/europe/gatwick-airp...

I think it's a very British whoopsie, they're plastered over the papers and they didn't do anything.

[danso]

I think the right to privacy vs. printing public info about the actions of our police is always going to be in tension. Of course, there's no argument that innocent people should have their privacy invaded, but ideally, innocent people shouldn't have been arrested at all. The flip side is when famous/powerful people are arrested but not charged, and the public not being able to know whether they got off because strings were pulled. And there's the overarching problem of people being disappeared with the public/press having no idea whether they were arrested, and for what reason. Which has led to some absurd situations in China recently:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/13/world/asia/china-fan-bing...

[snuxoll]

Public information about ongoing investigations and arrests wouldn't be problematic if our society didn't have such hilariously broken views on criminal investigations and trials.

Get arrested in connection with some well talked-about crime, but were released or found innocent at trial? Doesn't matter, you're still guilty in the eyes of the public. Hell, look at jury boxes in the US - you as a defendant are assumed guilty against the spirit of our constitution, because people suck.

Either we as a society need to fix our fucked up perceptions, or we need to have a serious discussion about the right to privacy up until the point that a verdict is delivered. Unfortunately, there's no evidence that we are going to fix the former in a timely manner.

[zozbot123]

> ... It's not in the public interest for us to know exactly who they are unless they're actually found guilty of a crime. ...

On the contrary, the commonly-acknowledged right of habeas corpus essentially requires the government to make the fact that someone is being detained public, at least if the prisoner himself so chooses. Privacy is a red herring here - habeas corpus is about preserving basic freedoms.

[hugh-avherald]

It's risible to claim that the press published the names because they were concerned about habeas corpus.

[dahart]

What do you mean when you say habeas corpus essentially requires a detention to be made public? Habeas corpus provides for a review of the legality of a detention for the requester. How & when is any information given publicly under habeas corpus laws? What makes you think habeas corpus and privacy can’t co-exist?

[hopler]

Without public knowledge and pressure, there is no check on authoritarian abuse and the law has no teeth.

[dahart]

Maybe, but that's not what I asked. Don't habeas corpus laws provide public access to a (perhaps private) legal review? When do laws require sharing results with the public, as the GP comment claimed? Can there be checks on authoritarian abuse that don't require public dissemination? Is the threat of publicity exactly the same thing as a requirement for publicity?

[wbl]

Imagine a country where the police arrest people and they vanish in the middle of the night, with no way to determine what their status is.

[HarryHirsch]

There is no need to imagine a country where mugshots are freely available, even is that person is later released without charge, that already exists, and we know what the practice does.

[dahart]

How does your question relate to publicity at all? Habeas corpus covers that situation, assuming the country you're imagining complies with habeas corpus standards.

[1ris]

Isn't this standard procedure in most western democracies?

[hopler]

> at least if the prisoner himself so chooses

is the missing part in most cases.

[dbdjfjrjvebd]

> at least if the prisoner himself so chooses

This is the key.

[cosmojg]

>Whoever caused the Gatwick chaos needs to be brought to justice

Absolutely, along with all of these clowns who are perpetuating the chaos.