ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, August 5, 1993                   TAG: 9308050246
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-6   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: WEST PALM BEACH, FLA.                                LENGTH: Short

RAPE-VICTIM SECRECY RULED UNCONSTITUTIONAL

A 1911 Florida statute that prevents the news media from identifying rape victims violates the First Amendment, a state appeals court said Wednesday as it declared the law unconstitutional.

The 4th District Court of Appeal cleared The Globe, a supermarket tabloid based in Boca Raton, of violating that law when it printed Patricia Bowman's name shortly after she accused William Kennedy Smith of rape. Smith was acquitted in 1991.

The appeals court said the state should not guard someone's privacy by restricting the news media. The state can try to keep a victim's identity a secret, but if reporters learn the name from other sources, the state cannot punish the media for publishing the truth, the court said.

- Knight-Ridder/Tribune 


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