I was watching the film All The President’s Men from 1976. It stars Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman as Carl Bernstein and Paul Woodward (Woodward and Bernstein) as the two Wash Post journalists who broke the Watergate Scandal involving President Richard Nixon. I was watching the moving because Robert Redford passed away last month, and I wanted to watch (re-watch) some of his work.
So much was different with the 70’s. The attire. The hardwire rotary dial phones (with multiple lines in fancy offices). The fact that people picked up their phones. If people were away from their desks, there were no answering machines. You would leave a message with a receptionist, and she (back then it was always a she) would leave the person a note (almost always on yellow paper) to call the person back.
What amazed me of Woodward and Bernstein was how easily they were able to access information, and how few barriers there existed back then to obtaining background information in those days. There are many more privacy barriers when it comes to access to information today.
In one scene, they attend at a library in Washington and they’re able to see instantaneously the names telephone numbers, addresses and amounts of all donors tied to the Democratic Party to elect the next President. With that hot list of contacts in hand, they’re able to knock door to door, or make cold calls. People actually either answered the door, or answered the phones to speak with these guys. Getting this sort of personal information so easily is almost unheard of these days. Getting people to cooperate with you is just as rare.
In another scene, they attend at an office in Miami and get a copy of a cheque from a bureacrat which can be tied back to the Watergate Scandal. This sort of disclosure coming so easily (just a plane ride away and some waiting time in a lobby) doesn’t happen so easy these days either.
Protection of privacy, and privacy laws have come a long way. Sometimes in a good way. Other times in a bad way. Here’s an everyday example which personal injury lawyers have to deal with on most cases.
There is a car accident; or a dog bite.
In a car accident case, the contact information (address, phone number) of the Defendant driver will be redacted, so you won’t know much about that person aside from perhaps their name. Sometimes, their insurance information is even redacted.
In a dog bite case, the redactions are more severe. The name, address and any other potential identifying information of the Defendant dog owner; along with his/her dog will be redacted as well in the name of privacy protection.
What we’ve seen is that police departments lean more on the side of redaction in order to “protect” or “not to expose” instead of leaning the other way towards disclosure. It’s the safer route because they are not exposing themselves to any potential liability. Safer to under produce and over redact, as oppose to the other way around.
This is the line of thinking when requests are made for information from personal injury lawyers. This sort of redact at all costs; or when in doubt, redact, mindset creates problems for Plaintiffs and for personal injury lawyers.
The personal injury lawyer cannot send out a notice letter if the Plaintiff does not have their name and contact information. It’s not a reflect for all Plaintiffs; particularly seriously injured accident victims to get the name and contact information of the at fault party. This can delay the case, and cause barriers to access to timely rehab benefits which might not otherwise be available through the publicly funded healthcare system. Even worse is that by the time the Plaintiff, or his/her personal injury lawyer is able to access that information; that the contact information might have changed. The Defendant might have moved residence, or worse yet, moved out of the City, Province or Country. If the Plaintiff cannot identify the Defendant, or cannot trace their whereabouts, then this creates a major obstacle to prosecuting a successful personal injury case.
We have one case where a pedestrian was run over by a car. After the car ran over the pedestrian, it fled the scene of the crime. This was a hit and run. The hitting was an offence. The failing to remain at the scene of the collision was another punishable offence. The Plaintiff was so injured he was taken away unconscious from the scene of the crime by ambulance directly to hospital. His first memory is waking up days later in a hospital bed. He had absolutely no way of getting the name, license plate or contact information of the at fault driver. The car that ran over the Plaintiff was a rental vehicle. You would think that the police would first inquire with the rental company who rented the vehicle and conduct a proper investigation. The reality is that they didn’t; and who knows why not. Your guess is as good as mine. I will chalk it up to under resourced or unwilling to do the paperwork to get access to the car rental records. Had this car accident taken place in the 1970’s when privacy laws were different, I could assure you that the police would have no problems getting the rental records from the rental car company and tracking this person down in order to bring him/her to justice. But, what happened is that the police could not obtain these records because they either did not, or could not access these records so easily. The privacy obstacle prevented a thorough investigation; or it was simply bad police work.
But, you know who was able to access the rental records and disclose them? The lawyers for the insurance company for the rental car company. They were incentivized to do so in order to potentially pass the exposure along to another insurance company so that they could save money. Funny how money gets people to work. Do you think if the police were incentivized with money on this investigation that they would have done a more thorough job? Isn’t that what they’re paid to do in the first place? Why should the police be paid more to do the job which they are already paid to do? Did this simply not get done because the paperwork to clear the privacy laws are onerous; or perhaps the officers just weren’t good at the paperwork. Perhaps this all fell through the cracks because there were more pressing issues to deal with? I cannot think of something more pressing than a hit and run leaving a person unconscious and on life support for a few days; but hey; that’s me.