NOTE: This blog entry includes material that some readers may find disturbing or offensive.<\/p>\n
The memo issued by Federal prosecutors in an effort to keep former North Country Assemblyman Chris Ortloff behind bars while he awaits trial included some explicit details about his alleged attempts to arrange a sexual encounter with two pre-teen girls.<\/p>\n
Various news organizations have offered their audiences greater or lesser amounts of detail from those public documents. <\/p>\n
Some are anxious that Mr. Ortloff still hasn’t yet told his side of the story. (NCPR, like other news organizations, is attempting to interview his attorney.)<\/p>\n
Others feel that the material is simply too horrifying.<\/p>\n
Editors at the Schenectady Daily Gazette ran an op-ed on Sunday explaining their reluctance to post public documents about the Ortloff case on their website.<\/p>\n
Here’s a descriptions of a discussion at the Gazette about whether or not to include the material.<\/p>\n
This one was fairly brief, with editors who read the document agreeing that its level of detail crossed the line, particularly because children were involved. We kept the document off our Web page. We were concerned both by the explicitness of some of the passages, as well as some potentially identifying information about alleged real-life victims.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
I’ve read the Federal document closely and I think it’s a fair call. It’s awful stuff.<\/p>\n