Decision of
the Complaints Committee 06296-17 Moran v Bootle Champion
Summary of
complaint
1. Paul
Moran complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation that the
Bootle Champion breached Clause 2 (Privacy), Clause 4 (Intrusion into grief or
shock), Clause 6 (Children) and Clause 9 (Reporting of Crime) of the Editors’
Code of Practice in an article headlined “Family ‘lost everything’ in arson
attack,” published on 12 April 2017.
2. The
article reported that the complainant and his family had been the victims of an
arson attack at their home on 5 April 2017. The article reported that two men
had set fire to the house in a case of mistaken identity, and that the family
were forced to the leave their home. The article stated that the complainant
had made a public appeal for information on Facebook and also included a
statement from a Detective who appealed for those with information to come
forward. The article also contained information about a Just Giving page set up
to raise money for the family and included a photograph of the exterior of the
property after the attack.
3. The
complainant said that the article contained the name and age of his young
daughter, who was a victim of the attack. The complainant was concerned that
the inclusion of these details infringed on his daughter’s privacy and affected
her safety in breach of Clause 2 and Clause 6 of the Editors’ Code.
4. The
complainant also expressed concern that the newspaper had handled the details
of the attack insensitively by including information about him and his family
and that this had added to their distress in breach of Clause 4. The
complainant said he had been contacted by the newspaper on Facebook and had not
responded and so considered that the newspaper should not have published the
family’s details. The complainant said that he had put a public post on
Facebook containing details about the attack, which included the names of
himself, his partner and daughter in an appeal for information. He did not
think that publically sharing this information justified the newspaper’s
publication of these details.
5. The
complainant also said that publishing the full names of the family members
involved, their partial address and a picture of the house after the attack,
represented an intrusion into their private life and as they were victims of
crime, their safety had been put at risk.
6. The
newspaper said that they became aware of the incident through a public
statement issued by Merseyside Police Press Office that appealed for
information on this serious crime. The newspaper said that it published the
story to help Mr Moran with his appeal for information and to generate support
for the family via the Just Giving appeal.
7. The
newspaper also said that the personal details of the family included in the
article were all in the public domain, as they had appeared in the Facebook
post that the complainant had made public, and which, by the complainant’s own
admission had gone viral and been “shared thousands of times.”
8. The
newspaper did not accept that it had breached the Code but apologised for the
upset caused to the complainant and his family.
Relevant Code
provisions
9. Clause
2 (Privacy) *
(i) Everyone
is entitled to respect for his or her private and family life, home, health and
correspondence, including digital communications.
(ii) Editors’
will be expected to justify intrusions into any individual’s private life
without consent. Account will be taken of the complainant’s own public
disclosures of information.
Clause 4
(Intrusion into grief or shock) *
In cases
involving personal grief or shock, enquiries and approaches must be made with
sympathy and discretion and publication handled sensitively. These provisions
should not restrict the right to report legal proceedings.
Clause 6
(Children) *
(i) All
pupils should be free to complete their time at school without unnecessary
intrusion.
Clause 9
(Reporting of Crime) *
(i) Relatives
or friends of persons convicted or accused of crime should not generally be
identified without their consent, unless they are genuinely relevant to the
story.
(ii) Particular
regard should be paid to the potentially vulnerable position of children who
witness, or are victims of, crime. This should not restrict the right to report
legal proceedings.
Findings of
the Committee
10. The Committee
first considered the publication of the complainant and his partner’s names,
and acknowledged that this had come at a distressing time for the complainant.
The complainant said that by identifying himself, his partner and their
daughter, the publication had breached their right to privacy; however this was
information the complainant placed in the public domain as part of a public
statement appealing for information. Its inclusion in the article did not
represent a breach of Clause 2.
11. The Committee then
turned to the complaint under Clause 2 and Clause 6 regarding the naming of the
complainant’s daughter. The complainant had published a Facebook post, which
had included within it a photograph, taken by someone else, which contained a
caption that had included his daughter’s name. This post, by the complainant's
own admission, had “gone viral” and been “shared thousands of times.” The
newspaper had not published any information about his daughter apart from her
name and the fact she was the complainant’s daughter. In these circumstances
the Committee did not consider that publication of the complainant’s daughter’s
first name represented a failure to respect her private life, or was an
unnecessary intrusion into her time at school. There was no breach of Clause 2
or Clause 6.
12. Given the
serious nature of this crime, and the public appeal for information by the
police, the newspaper and where the complainant had made a public comment via
Facebook, the publication of the names of the individuals involved did not
represent a failure to handle publication sensitively. The newspaper was also
not obliged to obtain the consent of the complainant prior to publication.
There was no breach of Clause 4.
13. Clause 9 relates
to the identification of family and friends of individuals convicted or accused
of crime. There was no breach of Clause 9.
Conclusion
14. The complaint was
not upheld
Remedial
action required
N/A
Date complaint received: 16/04/2017
Date decision issued: 26/06/2017