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Virginia Tech Report Cites Privacy Law Problems

Posted by samzenpus on from the pass-the-buck dept.

RickRussellTX writes "A panel of Bush administration officials, including several bureau chiefs, concludes that confusing privacy laws contributed to the Virgina Tech shootings. The report claims that confusion over student privacy and medical privacy laws "has limited the ability of these officials to prevent the kind of violence that occurred at Virginia Tech.""

1 of 381 comments (clear)

  1. Privacy law problems?? by olden · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Agreed. Blaming, even partially, "privacy laws" for this massacre is just plain dishonest.
    (if anything, the problem with privacy laws is that they're facing extinction)

    Snippets from a news report written shortly after the tragedy:
    "A medical examination found that (...) [Cho's] insight and judgment are normal"
    "Although Cho's writings were disturbing, mental health professionals say the student's behavior didn't reach the threshold that would have demanded more aggressive intervention."
    "You can't do anything unless there's imminent risk that's somewhat foreseeable to take away someone's civil rights"
    (source: http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/19/student.counselin g/ )

    Seems clear to me that no sharing of medical information with law enforcement would have helped here.