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Prescription for medical-legal story: more sources

By Mark Obbie

Dirk Johnson has this interesting and informative story today in the Times about a criminal case in Wisconsin that examines where the line is between religious freedom and criminal mistreatment of ill children. He clearly explains the issues and provides useful context about controversies over parents' religiously motivated refusals to get the necessary care for their children. But the story's sourcing is too thin to stamp itself as authoritative. Besides the ruling of the judge in the case, who cleared the case for trial by interpreting the balancing test required by state law, Johnson quotes only two other sources: one seemingly neutral local expert, and one advocate whose strong beliefs come with some personal baggage. That advocate provides a crucial statistic in the story -- the number of deaths attributed to religiously motivated denial of care -- and that makes me nervous, in part because the advocate came to this cause after her son died. That doesn't rob her of credibility, but it would make me want to hunt for confirmation and additional points of view in the story.

Full post as published by Lawbeat on January 21, 2009 (boomark / email).