Espresso Pundit posts the complete "Desert Divas" client list

PHXated was at a small but lively Society of Professional Journalists meeting last night, and the conversation predictably turned to the varying ways old-school media types and newer practitioners view their respective responsibility to society and their readers.

To me it’s patent that the daily newspaper world, for example, long ago forfeited its claims to moral superiority. Not because of any particular turpitude, but just because of arrogance, lassitude, and timidity.

Anyway, I thought about it again while being unable to stop myself from taking a look at the list of Desert Divas clients Greg Patterson, a conservative former state rep. who blogs as the “Espresso Pundit,” put up.

He says the list of names was already available; this, however, is a complete spreadsheet with the identities of the alleged clients, their addresses, and, most queasiness-inducing, a column of notes.

All in all, pretty grim reading:

WAS TRYING TO USE STOLEN CREDIT CARD!!!! CARD WAS IN A WOMAN’S NAME, CLAIMED HE HAD HER PERMISION

PER SCOTT AT AZ-CONFIDENTIAL DO NOT SEE EVER!!! EXTREME CASE OF HERPES!!!!

MANAGER AT THE HOTEL TOLD BRITTNEY TO LEAVE THAT IF SHE DIDNT SHE WOULD BE IN BIG TROUBLE

And, forgive me:

HAS HUGE OPEN WOUND ON HIS BELLY & VERY DIRTY – HAD LENA IN TEARS

Anyway, besides the obvious issue that not all of the names and address are necessarily correct, there’s also sensitive medical details, and even private information that probably should not have been released by the police—like security codes for apartment complexes and gated communities:

“LIKES JAMIE & JAMIE LIKES TO GO THERE GATE CODE [XXXX] BLDG # 9 APT # 2152 BELL RD & 101S”

I blocked out the code and didn’t include the full address, but you can see the problem.

Here’s how Patterson said the material was revealed:

After a few months of dead ends, I finally went to my Secret Weapon—Sal DiCiccio. Councilman DiCiccio thinks that if information is public that it should actually be available to…you know…the public. DiCiccio sent his right hand guy, former Tribune writer Hal DeKeyser to take care of it and by golly, they stone walled him too…but persistence pays off.

I’m agnostic on releasing the clients’ names; but the police department screwed up by not redacting the list of details that could help burglars and predators. And Patterson wasn’t smart by not hiding the most sensitive information himself.