[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.