Julie Moos reports:
The Journal News honored victims of the Newtown, Conn., shooting on its front page Christmas Day with memorial candles that named the 26 students and staff killed at Sandy Hook Elementary. The paper chose a less lyrical approach last weekend, when — in response to the shooting – it published maps with the names and home addresses of people who had been issued pistol permits in Westchester County, where the Gannett paper is based, and nearby Rockland County.
So how did folks express their displeasure? They doxed the reporter, the editor, and the publisher.
Read more on Poynter.org about the controversy, keeping in mind that this is not the first time this paper – or other papers have done something like this.
As a gun owner myself I would not be and am not pleased with this. While this is “public record” information what the people at the paper essentially did was to take all that information and collate it into a public report. From published reports and their own admission they not only wanted what they published but also exact information on what the permits covered (i.e. “permit 493 covers a Smithfield 1911A .45 ACP”). The police had the presence of mind to refuse that part of the request, as it was probably considered endangering certain people in particular who might have either ‘criminal preferred’ guns or those who have guns worth into the tens of thousands each.
The part I find most disturbing about this sort of ‘reporting’ is that the intent is not really to inform, but to intimidate and harass the legal owners of firearms. While the reporter is a self-professed gun-owner I’m betting whoever assigned him the story probably is not a gun owner and is most likely someone with an aversion to the entire idea of gun ownership.