Enforcement, Not Exposure

For at least a year, there has been considerable support for an idea aimed at reducing prostitution in parts of the San Fernando Valley and the rest of Los Angeles. Why not take a list of those arrested or convicted of soliciting prostitutes and broadcast their names over local cable channels?

Valley City Councilman Hal Bernson has long supported the concept. A similar program was tried 13 years ago when the names of arrestees were released to news organizations by then-city attorney Ira Reiner. Only two news outlets agreed to use the names, however, and the practice was dropped after a judge ordered the city attorney to refrain from giving out the home addresses of suspected solicitors.

Bernson has been pressing the issue again, with the support of other council members and community activists. We can certainly understand the appeal of such a concept. Unfortunately, it amounts to a very risky idea. The reasons have been outlined in a sober analysis from the current city attorney’s office.

First, the city faces lawsuits if it publishes or televises a common name shared by many others who are innocent. Using photos along with the names is another idea, but the Los Angeles Police Department doesn’t photograph every person arrested for prostitution. To do so and then distribute every photograph might cost the cash-strapped city as much as $400,000 annually.

That brings us back to the option used 13 years ago: publicizing home addresses, but that has already been rejected by a Superior Court judge on the grounds that it violates the right to privacy.

And why do so at all when there is no groundswell of support for drawing the same attention to people convicted of much more serious offenses, such as drunk driving?

The best way to attack the prostitution problem is to go after it through equally strict prosecution of both the purveyors and the solicitors of this illegal activity. Publishing the names of customers only figures to create another problem for the city instead of solving one.