Endorsements and editorials are made solely by the ownership of this newspaper. As is the case at most newspapers across the nation, The Spokesman-Review newsroom and its editors are not a part of this endorsement process. (Learn more.)
Editorial: Teen’s hoax highlights technological tests to law
The word “adolescent” comes from French roots that mean “to grow up.”
And the long journey to maturity is clearly unfinished in the case of a Sandpoint teenager who has been deemed responsible for a phony Craigslist ad that purported to offer a 4-year-old boy for sale.
Sandpoint police are still investigating, and Chief R. Mark Lockwood expects they’ll decide next week what if any charges to lodge against the 17-year-old. Some early possibilities that have been considered – identity theft, fraud, violation of adoption laws – all sound like a stretch.
Unless the boy intended to follow through on the deception and separate a victim from money or something else of value, officials may be hard pressed to come up with an existing state law to apply.
The absence of a specific statute hardly means no harm was done, however. The hoax consumed many valuable hours by Spokane County sheriff’s deputies, who traced the source to Idaho, and the Sandpoint police, who took over from there. Those finite resources could have been put to much better use on real crimes.
For all the convenience the Internet brings to our lives, it also opens up broad opportunities for far-reaching misconduct. Pranks that once upon a time ended somewhat innocently with the person on the other end of the phone line now race around the world at light speed, potentially reaching millions.
The law has always been challenged to keep up with technological and societal change, but the electronic age has accelerated the pace to an exhausting degree. Wisely and necessarily, lawmakers have set appropriate priorities. They first went after Internet predators who abuse and exploit children, and they cracked down on identity thieves.
In the meantime, more needs to be done to seize the attention of idle minds that amuse themselves with hoaxes that needlessly stir up society’s fears and predictably squander law enforcement’s attention.
It wasn’t a joke and it wasn’t funny. And if it wasn’t against the law, it should be.