A dangerous case

A federal court case hopefully won't affect the way journalists do their work in Pennsylvania.

A plea agreement was reached Tuesday with Donald E. Stoner, 37, of Lancaster County, who is charged with identity theft.

According to court documents, Stoner and a co-conspirator used the Internet to find people who were convicted of driving under the influence in Lancaster and York counties. They focused on those who paid their fines all at once and/or hired a private attorney because it was believed that those people were likely to have good credit.

Using that information, Stoner and the co-conspirator went to the courthouses in Lancaster and York counties to cull personal information about their victims from criminal complaints and other court documents, court documents state. They then opened bank accounts in the victims' names over the Internet and sought and received "payday" loans, withdrawing the money using debit cards or cash transfers.

The Associated Press reported that there were more than 100 victims, and the scheme generated about $27,000.

Why is this case dangerous potentially dangerous to Pennsylvania journalists? We use court documents every day to report on the alleged criminal activity in our region.

While the courts should protect personal information such as Social Security numbers, the Stoner case could be used as an excuse to make it harder to access the public record.

Pennsylvania has gotten much better with open records with a state courts Web site containing criminal dockets from both Magisterial District and Common Pleas courts. We don't want to take any steps backward.