Joseph Talbot, you should have known better: the Streisand Effect will get you every time

Joseph Talbot, drunk driver

Upstate New York banker Joseph Talbot buys 1,000 copies of local paper (at $1.25 per) in attempt to keep his mugshot and news of his DUI arrest quiet. Now the story's gone national.

Many years ago, on a Monday morning, feet on my desk, coffee beside me, I received a call from a friend in trouble: he'd been arrested for a (mild) road rage incident in Old Greenwich over the weekend; was there anyone I knew at Greenwich Time who could keep the arrest out of the paper?

"Well, Alan," I said, "if I weren't spilling donut crumbs on the police blotter's report of your sudden fame, I'd ask you for a retainer and go to work. As it is, save your money". 

Lawyers can be cruel like that.