TMZ Identifies Teen Boy Who Is an Alleged Sex Crime Victim

According to the Associate Press, the celebrity Web site, TMZ, published a photograph and an article Wednesday about a movie star's teenage son who is an alleged sex crime victim. This goes against professional journalism standards largely followed by the mainstream news media.

The story claims the boy is in a relationship with a 22-year-old woman and that the woman's ex-boyfriend told police she was having sex with a minor.

Kelly McBride, ethics group leader at Poynter Institute, said the majority of news organizations do not identify or photograph sex crime victims because of the stigma attached to the issue. She also believes the only reason TMZ ran the story was because of who the child is. She thinks TMZ would not have printed the story if the sex crime victim was female. McBride said being a victim of a sex crime is just as harmful for a young boy as it is for a young girl and should not be handled differently.