Wiki143:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard/Archive13

WP:BLP and primary sources published in secondary sources

This aspect of BLP seems to be causing confusion, specifically Material from third-party primary sources should not be used unless it has first been published by a reliable secondary source.
Here's the general situation; Imagine the subject is a lawyer/judge/litigant/ or in some way owes their notability to actions in a court of law which generates primary sources as a nature of its function. The secondary source, a newspaper, describes in broad strokes information gleaned from court transcripts because it is so detailed that discussing specifics would take too much space for a newspaper article.

Some believe that mentioning anything in a primary source such as a court record, which is not discussed in the newspaper article, would be a violation of WP:BLP regardless of its applicability to the subject's notability. If this is true then primary sources should never be linked since they will by their very nature discuss specifics/info not mentioned in the secondary source.

Others think that info from a primary source which goes into greater detail than the secondary source is ok so long as it doesn't try to change the POV expressed of the secondary AND directly relates to the subject's notability. I'm closer to this opinion since I agree that while all primary sources may not be acceptable for BLP references, certainly court documents related to notability should be because they are both reliable and verifiable. Anynobody 07:39, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I (cautiously) agree. The great danger with primary sources is that by the nature they tend to require synthesis to use in an article. To use your example, that of a court record, I could see using a court document that shows a person was convicted of a crime as proof that they were convicted, and received a certain sentence. I imagine that this generally would not offend BLP provided the matter received appropriate weight within an article. Of greater concern would be matters that were testified to in a hearing, or alleged in court papers. Even if one side or the other wins the case, is that proof the a particular claim is true? Or was the other evidence so convincing that the prevailing side won in spite of the claim? Often the court won't tell you. Use of the documents in that type of case, I think, is problematic. Xymmax (talk) 16:32, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Definitely they are sources to be used with caution, for the exact reason you pointed out, indeed synthesis and even all out original research could be easily introduced. I see the use of court records as being suitable to do essentially neutral things like;

• Documenting each side's arguments without drawing conclusions,
• Elaborate when a secondary source is vague in referencing aspects of a case, for example imagine a reporter citing how a lack of time would prevent person x from committing crime y without further elaboration. In this hypothetical lets say the court record shows x being in another country at the time. I'd imagine our text to read something like, "A report by Paper Z cited Person X's lack of time to commit the crime,^[1] as court records show him/her being out of the country."^[2] Anynobody 07:51, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

With no secondary source having that as the reason for the statement, it sure looks like OR to me. Which I'm ok with, since I think the real problem is that you need to recognize a limit on the application of OR when it gets seriously in the way of what WP:NOTOR calls the "responsibility to present an accurate and factual overview of the topic addressed in the article". Suppose your text read "A report by Paper Z cited Person X's lack of time to commit the crime, stating that court records show him as being out of the country^[1]", but examination of the court records show this statement to simply be false, not as a matter of what WP:BLP calls "a conjectural interpretation of a source" but as a simple black-and-white fact, the court records showing X entered the country the day before and left it the day after the crime. And further suppose that no RS can be found to contradict Paper Z, just, maybe, several quoting Paper Z. Do you suppress mention of Paper Z's influential but erroneous assertion? Do you quote it, suppressing mention of the fact that it's wrong? Do you quote it, but supply a caveat supplying the contrary evidence and expressing puzzlement, generalizing what WP:NOTOR suggests only in the context of "expert material"? (This is not a pure hypothetical -- I've recently had occasion to do the last.) Andyvphil (talk) 12:52, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Can BLP apply to a group? i.e., a court ruled that a newspaper article was "prima facie libelous and defamatory" and awarded damages to a group for libel. Now, a user keeps referring to the "sexual abuse" case when really it was a case of libel in favor of the group (and actually, the case he cites was a higher court case on a procedural/jurisdictional question, i.e., can an individual sue for libel if their group was defamed, or does defamation apply only to individuals?). Given that a court already ruled these allegations libelous, it seems that it also would be libelous to re-post the same information on Wiki? Advice would be appreciated.Renee (talk) 17:55, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

I found the answer to my own question. Yes, the court agreed that a member of a group could be libeled if the group was libeled. Here is the summary judgement where the judge denied the appeal (the appeal said only an individual can be libeled, not a group, the judge denied that), specifically, "Prima facie offence under section 307 I.P.C. is appearing against the accused applicant [the Pioneer newspaper]. It is not a case where charge sheet may be quashed." Here is the full ruling where the judge states the newspaper article and allegations are "prima facie libelous and defamatory." (page 4, #5) Thanks. Renee (talk) 15:18, 28 March 2008 (UTC)