Media must share some responsibility for devastation

Who shares responsibility for the devastation wreaked by the sex-abuse investigation in Wenatchee? Detective Bob Perez, state workers, mental health therapists, police, prosecutors, judges and "timidly silent" legal watchdogs such as the ACLU, says the P-I.

True enough, as far as it goes, but what of the P-I reporters' colleagues in the media? Is it not the paramount duty of the Fourth Estate to shine a timely light on official misconduct? Not until last fall did the P-I begin the investigation reported this week in a series headlined "The Power to Harm." How did the media treat the matter in 1995 and 1996, when a poisonous mist of fear and falsehood hung over Wenatchee?

The story is incomplete if it fails to address that question.

Richard Robohm
Seattle

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