Home      Login

Abstract: 

“Well, we really botched that one. What’ll we stamp it? ‘Secret’ or ‘Top Secret?’” This dialogue is borrowed from a Herblock cartoon that appeared in The Washington Post some years ago. The conversation supposedly takes place between two government employees. It reflects my reaction to the article, “Correctional Peer Review Loses Privilege,” by Dr. Joseph E. Paris, that appeared recently in Correctional Health Care Report (Vol. 7, No. 2). It also illustrates my bias, because I believe that the cure for timidity in government is not to cloak decisionmaking in more secrecy, but to subject it to the healthy glare of greaterpublic transparency.

Keywords: Agster v. Maricopa County, Agster v. Maricopa County, peer review documents, Estelle v. Gamble, Farmer v. Brennan

Affiliations:  1: civil rights attorney.