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Show ! In 1979 a teenaged Inmate . in the Pettis County Jail had been subjected to 'abuse, torture, assault and deviate sexual intercourse over a period of a week'. So said a county grand jury report. The irony of the situation was that the grand jury had been called to investigate the incident only because of a published newspaper story, and then the jury criticized the newspaper for irresponsible irrespon-sible reporting. No one even spoke of the incident until the newspaper pieced together togeth-er the story in spite of the county sheriff's denial of access ac-cess to the victim. The publisher volunteered to appear before the grand jury to answer the charge of irresponsible reporting, but when he learned that his testimony would be taken tak-en in secret, he decided to , print his response in his paper. "Government conducted con-ducted without public scu-tiny," scu-tiny," he wrote, "becomes poor government. And the losers will be you." The quality of local law enforce -ment was corrected only be -casue a courageous publisher pub-lisher had the Constitutionally Constitution-ally guaranteed right of freedom free-dom of the press. |