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Comment by ziddoap | Hacker News Reader

I was under the (apparently false?) assumption that under-18s couldn't be named. The alleged mastermind here is 17, yet is named and pictured.

Interestingly, when I first checked this out ~8 minutes ago, they stated that they would not name the alleged mastermind due to the fact he was under 18. In the update ~4 minutes ago, they have removed that section and named him.

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Florida has some of the most permissive laws about mugshots and criminal info.

The reason for the "Florida Man" meme is not that people in Florida are more weird than anywhere else, just that it's easier to find the mugshots online.

I always thought this was for precisely the oppposite - i.e. that news headlines (edit: I mean whole articles) were more often "A Florida Man has been arrested" because they were not allowed/didn't have the names.

I think using the term "Florida Man" is a meme now and probably carries more weight than using the accused's actual name.

From the wikipedia article:

> Miami New Times claimed that freedom of information laws in Florida make it easier for journalists to obtain information about arrests from the police than in other states and that this is responsible for the large number of news articles

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_Man

I understand now, the headline reads "Florida Man arrested" and then the article will have "Bob Bobbinson was arrested today for ..."

How many headlines about non-public figures have you seen that include someone's name?

"Tim Jones has been arrested" isn't exactly an informative headline.

I Googled the name hoping to prove that wrong, I wish I hadn't.

Well that's just taking things too literally. I meant the whole article would use "Florida man" instead of a name.

The headline is usually "A Florida Man has been arrested" because news stations all around the country dig through Florida public records to fill space when their local news is slow. It says "Florida" because it is not local to the outlet that is publishing it. Local news usually says "local man" or specifies a locality.

The story below the linked one is how a man rammed his way into a gated community, beat two people to death with a baseball bath, and then the police found the suspect unconscious after he drank some bleach.

That seems more weird than my local news, by a bit.

Maybe it's weirder than your local news, because your local news never finds out about those weird police calls like they do in Florida?

It's my opinion that Florida is weirder, because driving around, the weird signs of weird people (roadside, or on their vehicles for instance) are weirder and more common than up north. Not an airtight proof, but an independent datum not biased for the same reasons as the news.

This is a demonstration of selection bias.

> That seems more weird than my local news, by a bit.

Come to Oregon and we can talk weird.

That's still downstream of Florida's sunshine laws. If that happens in your state, there's a chance the media doesn't hear about it, or hears about it too late.

In Florida, the media hears about anything that involves an arrest because it's all published for public inspection. It's not just mugshots but other records too.

The smallest community newspapers in Florida will have a section about who got arrested.

I grew up in Florida. It's not just easier to find mug shots online. It's a weird place.

Alligators:

https://nypost.com/2020/06/11/florida-man-fights-off-alligat...

https://nypost.com/2018/07/30/florida-man-brings-gator-into-...

https://www.wfla.com/news/florida/8-foot-gator-wrestled-from...

Pythons:

https://www.naplesnews.com/story/news/local/2019/08/12/6-foo...

https://www.foxnews.com/science/alligator-fights-python-on-f...

Driving dogs:

https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/22/us/florida-dog-drives-circles...

Kangaroos:

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/local/broward/fort-lauderdale/f...

Speed-trap towns that had to decommission their police:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kELze26IXpk

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldo,_Florida

Seconded, grew up in Tampa. Florida is weird, just not quite as weird as "Florida Man" makes it look.

Those aren't particularly weird. People chopping off their limbs in copy-cat insurance scams is weird: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vernon,_Florida

For over a hundred years kooks and scammers from the Northeast and Midwest have made their way down to Florida. It's a weird place because weird and disreputable people move there. (Source: I grew up in the panhandle, and also inherited some "beach front" property in the middle of the woods that an uncle bought in the 1960s from a Chicago developer front running a classic Florida real estate racket. Also, see "Oh, Florida!: How America's Weirdest State Influences the Rest of the Country".)

Don't forget the random cannibal attacks!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miami_cannibal_attack

If anyone's interested in an in depth dive into the "Florida Man" meme, the podcast Citations Needed did a great (imo) episode on it: https://soundcloud.com/citationsneeded/episode-75-florida-ma...

The _Florida Man_ documentary is also equally fascinating and depressing.

https://vimeo.com/118532076

It has been a journalistic tradition done out of good faith not to print the names of accused minors. This has largely been done industry-wide under an implicit "gentleman's agreement." Similar traditions include not printing the names of victims of alleged rape victims or other sexual crimes.

But there's no law against it that I am aware of.

Update: 18 USC Section 5038 (Juvenile Justice Act) generally prohibits the publication of juvenile delinquency records, including the identity of the accused: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/5038

Note that this does not apply to violations of State laws, only Federal law violations. States may further restrict the publication of juvenile records.

There actually are very few legal restrictions on naming minors. There is substantially more scrutiny applied to false reporting when it involves accusing a minor of a crime. Most of the time when publications refuse to name a minor it’s because they promised not to while obtaining the minor’s name.

There are lots of restrictions on identifying minors charged with crimes, but they apply to court documents, not to the media.

The courts have historically ruled on the press's right to name accused minors:

https://splc.org/2020/01/naming-names-identifying-minors/

Maybe some other news outlet named him first and they updated their own article to include that tidbit as well, so as not to be outdone?

I was under the impression that because he was charged as an adult the info would be released.

My guess would be that he is being tried as an adult and thus not eligible for the protections afforded to juveniles.

Tried as an adult for a hack on a social media site?

Don't expect reason or a sense of proportionality from USA "justice system". Prosecuting a social media hack will get a lot more attention than prosecuting e.g. some common crime of violence. Prosecutors are basically the worst people in USA. (In case you're wondering, yes they are worse than police.)

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