Hi, Canadian Couple!
True enough.
However, I seem to recall in this case that the national media had picked up on the Van Dam case early into her disappearance, thus it was probably prior to the lawyers or police, or whoever it was, revealing the parents' extra curricular activities.
And as you said, the defense lawyers are attacking the victims in this case. They don't seem to have any other sort of defense strategy, so the media is in a spot where they do have to report this info.
Good points in the rest of your post. I just wanted to comment on the media portion.