I see piss poor examples of “journalism” on a daily basis, but what I saw today goes above and beyond and is just downright irresponsible.  If you haven’t heard anything about this Clark Rockefeller fellow, then by all means click that link and get caught up before continuing.  It really is a fascinating tale, complete with false identities, murder, and kidnapping.  The fact that it is REAL and not a script for a movie is scary.  I’m sure the Hollywood types are already in talks to acquire the rights.

The Boston Globe (among others) have reported that this man may have married a woman in 1981, in order to get a green card, and left town the following day.  Really, that is all there is to the story.  I say he may have married her, since they have no official proof that Clark Rockefeller is the man the media says he is, though it looks highly likely.  So, the little writeup with the globe talks about how this woman is shaken by the experience of finding out who this man is and what he may have done, and for whatever reasons that she has gone into hiding (probably to avoid being hounded by the media).

In a move that leaves me guessing what their motives are, the Globe then goes and publishes detailed information about where this woman lives, what kind of food she grows in her garden, and where she works.  This is what was posted at the end of their article, with the offending bits replaced with less revealing information.

WOMAN and her husband live in a COLOR two-story house with COLOR trim on a dead-end street shaded by maple trees in a working-class neighborhood of CITY. WOMAN and her husband have a garden overflowing with corn, squash and wildflowers. She is a POSITION at RESTAURANT, a trendy restaurant near LANDMARK in CITY’s DISTRICT.

All I can say is what the fuck?  Why in the world would you publish something like that?  That she grows corn, squash and wildflowers in her garden means nothing.  The color of her home, the restaurant where she works, all completely irrelevant to the fact that she married a man over TWENTY FIVE YEARS AGO so he could get a green card.

I’ve put in emails to both the reporter and her editor asking for their reasoning for publishing this information.  If I hear anything back, I’ll update this post.