A 17-year-old girl was caught for allegedly using Craigslist.com to sell 'soft'ware, a pseudonym for a web escort service.

Subsequently, her name and mug shot are splashed all over the net, TV, and the front pages in newspapers. She is also charged as an 'a-d-u-l-t'!!

Now, you may have noticed that I haven’t identified the girl’s name. It’s not necessary, especially since it can pass as character defamation.

I don’t mean to be the morale police, but it’s bad enough that the teenager and her mother ran a prostitution ring and sold escort services to married men.  It’s even worse that the mother allowed her daughter to carry on with such family business.

Certain ethical questions cannot help but probe my conscience. Should the identity of battered adolescents be public knowledge? Should we divulge the gory details of underage trials? As our sensibilities continue numbing down to the latest headlines, I have one question to ask: Which way is society heading towards?

If the person is a prominent personality like Phil Spector or Michael Jackson, public knowledge is inevitable. However, juvenile delinquents should be spared from the heat of public scrutiny. Children, in particular, should be protected from the ravages of ill-fame.

To safeguard the adolescent from future turmoil and hardship, many are urging the media to restrain the amount of information being published. If
self-restraint is an impossible, federal officials should enforce restrictions. This is the media’s vicious cycle – keeping the public more entertained than informed.

Couldn’t the girl, allegedly caught in a cycle of events, be stopped from being dragged through the muck?

Currently, the accused has since been released on bond. Court dates set for May are pending.