Over the past couple of weeks, the Leader has received several letters that have either been unsigned or in such a state that it has been difficult deciphering their intended meaning.
As such, we felt that it was time to address this particular issue and to remind our readers that while we encourage you to write letters, we would ask that they be legible, coherent, and signed with a first and a last name.
We do not publish libelous, nor unsigned, letters.
Our reporters put their names on what they write, and stand by what is published in our weekly editions. It is only fair to expect the same from anyone with material being published within our pages.
What you may not know or understand is that the onus for what appears on our pages does not rest on the shoulders of the people we receive letters from, nor the groups or individuals who are represented thusly, but instead it is our own responsibility and consequences reach us first.
We appreciate your feedback and interest in the newspaper’s activity, and we believe strongly in community, striving for readership engagement with each and every story.
However, it is not the prerogative of the Barrhead Leader to participate in any slanderous or libelous commentary, nor to defame the character of any individual, and this leads us to the second point of this week’s editorial.
One Facebook user suggests our bi-weekly court reports ought to be longer, and that they should focus more on highlighting the repetitive nature of some of the members of the criminal element within our community, hoping that ‘public shaming’ would result in serious change with regards to these particular individual’s lives.
On the one hand, we understand and appreciate the level of frustration that the majority of our readers feel.
Nothing is worse than having your property stolen time and time again, knowing that the individuals responsible will most likely get time served, probation or a light fine.
On the other hand, there are limitations to what we can publish in a court report.
Individuals under the age of 18, for example, are protected by autonomy and cannot be named due to the Youth Criminal Justice Act, which came into effect on April 1, 2003 and is itself a revision of the Young Offender’s Act.
The reason they cannot be named is to prevent the stigmatization of troubled youth, as it has been found to hinder their rehabilitation and often leads to further criminal activities.
By the same token, the names of youth victims cannot be published for the same reasons.
Publication bans extend beyond protecting the identities of young people, and sometimes the cases that you and I are most interested in knowing the particulars of, those are the ones covered by this type of legal red-tape.
In those kinds of situations, unfortunately, our hands are tied.
Everyone is entitled to their day in court and is innocent until proven guilty.
