Decision
of the Complaints Committee – 11590-22 Lynch v kentonline.co.uk
Summary
of Complaint
1. Gloria
Lynch, on behalf of her family member, complained to the Independent Press
Standards Organisation that kentonline.co.uk breached Clause 1 (Accuracy),
Clause 6 (Children) and Clause 9 (Reporting of crime) of the Editors’ Code of
Practice in:
- An
article headlined “Podcast: Girls throw drink over pregnant woman and 'assault'
staff at McDonald's in Maidstone”, published on 14 September 2022;
- The
accompanying podcast;
- An
article headlined "McDonald's security guard arrested after girls kicked
out of Maidstone restaurant", published on 15 September 2022;
- A
Facebook post shared by the publication which linked to the 15 of September
article.
2. The
first article comprised several short summaries of the stories included in the
embedded podcast. It reported an allegation that a pregnant woman had a drink
thrown over her and that staff were “allegedly assault[ed]” at a McDonald’s. It
also reported that “witnesses” to the incident had said that “trouble involving
a group of girls had broke[n] out”. The complainant was representing one of the
girls referred to in the article; her family member. The article contained an
embedded podcast, accompanied by a photograph of three girls on the street with
their faces pixelated.
3. The
embedded podcast was a verbal recording of the text of the article, and also
included an audio clip of the incident. This included a man stating he “had
seen it all” and several girls shouting;
it had also been censored with bleeps.
4. The
second article reported on the same incident and stated that girls in the group
had been seen “verbally abusing staff and customers”. It reported that “footage
from the incident shows the girls swearing and shouting at McDonald's staff and
customers”. It also stated that a security guard had been arrested and charged
with “assault with intent to resist arrest”. It contained quotes from a witness
saying that girls in the group had shouted and sworn at the security guard. The
article contained two images of three of the girls on the street, with their
faces pixelated.
5. The
second article had also been shared on Facebook by the publication. The
headline stated, “McDonald’s security guard charged with assault”, and beneath
this it stated that “A security guard has been arrested after an incident in
which a group of girls verbally abused s…” [sic]. As noted above, this article
reported that the security guard had been charged with assault with intent to
resist arrest following the incident, and contained an image of the group of
girls, three of whom had their faces pixelated, and one of whom was turned away
from the camera so that only a small portion of her face was visible.
6. The
complainant said that the article breached Clause 9, which states that
particular regard should be paid to the potentially vulnerable position of
children under the age of 18 who witness, or are victims of, crime. The
complainant said that in circumstances where the guard had been arrested for
assaulting a policeman, the inclusion of the images of the girls in the article
was unnecessary.
7. She
also said that the article had breached Clause 6. She said that despite the
fact the images were pixelated, her family member was identifiable. She said
that the article had been widely shared and that due to this her family member
was so distressed she did not want to go to school.
8. The
complainant also said that the article was inaccurate in breach of Clause 1.
She said the articles and podcast inaccurately reported that the girls had been
abusive to staff, which was denied, and she claimed that the correct position
was that the security guard had been abusive.
9. The
publication did not accept a breach of the Code. It said that no one had been
charged for assaulting the girls and there had been no prosecution following
the incident. Therefore, the girls could not be described as victims of a
crime. The publication did acknowledge that they could be described as
witnesses to a crime, as the security guard had been charged with the assault
of a policeman. However, it also said that the guard could have been found not
guilty, noting that, during IPSO’s investigation, it was reported that the
charge against the security guard had been dropped prior to him entering a
plea. The publication said that even if the guard were to have been found
guilty, had the charge not been dropped, there was a strong argument that the
crime had resulted from the girls’ earlier actions.
10. The
publication said that in any case, the inclusion of the images did not amount
to a breach of Clause 9. It said that the images were stills from a video that
had been widely circulated online. It provided a screenshot of the video on a
Facebook group with 33,000 members, which had been published on 11 September,
three days before the first article. It also noted that the incident took place
in a public space with a multitude of witnesses. The publication said, despite
this, that it had paid particular regard to the girls’ vulnerable position by
pixelating their faces where they were otherwise identifiable in the published
images.
11.
Similarly, the publication said that the publication of the images was not a
breach of Clause 6. It said that it had taken steps not to identify the girls
by pixelating their faces and noted that they were not in school uniform, which
may have helped identify them to classmates. It repeated that the video had
been widely circulated without censorship on social media and that it
considered that this would be more likely to be accessed by other pupils at the
school than the articles and podcast.
12. The
publication also said that it considered the articles were in the public
interest as the incident took place in a popular restaurant in the town centre
which regularly suffers from anti-social behaviour and “yobbery”. It said,
therefore, that reporting on incidents involving allegations of impropriety,
contributed to a debate on a matter of public interest. It also said that the
inclusion of the images was proportionate where they had been pixelated to hide
the girls faces. It said that as the article was clearly in the public interest
there had not been a discussion of this prior to it being published.
13. The
publication also provided the full video that had been published on Facebook,
which showed girls in the group swearing and shouting in the street. In
addition, it had interviewed a person who had witnessed the incident and
supplied notes which supported the accuracy of the quotes in the article.
Relevant
Code Provisions
Clause 1
(Accuracy)
i) The
Press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading or distorted
information or images, including headlines not supported by the text.
ii) A
significant inaccuracy, misleading statement or distortion must be corrected,
promptly and with due prominence, and — where appropriate — an apology published.
In cases involving IPSO, due prominence should be as required by the regulator.
iii) A
fair opportunity to reply to significant inaccuracies should be given, when
reasonably called for.
iv) The
Press, while free to editorialise and campaign, must distinguish clearly
between comment, conjecture and fact.
Clause 6
(Children)*
i) All
pupils should be free to complete their time at school without unnecessary
intrusion.
ii) They
must not be approached or photographed at school without permission of the
school authorities.
iii)
Children under 16 must not be interviewed or photographed on issues involving
their own or another child’s welfare unless a custodial parent or similarly
responsible adult consents.
iv)
Children under 16 must not be paid for material involving their welfare, nor
parents or guardians for material about their children or wards, unless it is
clearly in the child's interest.
v)
Editors must not use the fame, notoriety or position of a parent or guardian as
sole justification for publishing details of a child's private life.
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 under the age of 18 who witness, or are victims of, crime. This should
not restrict the right to report legal proceedings.
iii)
Editors should generally avoid naming children under the age of 18 after arrest
for a criminal offence but before they appear in a youth court unless they can
show that the individual’s name is already in the public domain, or that the
individual (or, if they are under 16, a custodial parent or similarly
responsible adult) has given their consent. This does not restrict the right to
name juveniles who appear in a crown court, or whose anonymity is lifted.
The Public
Interest (*)
There
may be exceptions to the clauses marked * where they can be demonstrated to be
in the public interest.
1. The
public interest includes, but is not confined to:
- Detecting
or exposing crime, or the threat of crime, or serious impropriety.
- Protecting
public health or safety.
- Protecting
the public from being misled by an action or statement of an individual or
organisation.
- Disclosing
a person or organisation’s failure or likely failure to comply with any
obligation to which they are subject.
- Disclosing
a miscarriage of justice.
- Raising
or contributing to a matter of public debate, including serious cases of
impropriety, unethical conduct or incompetence concerning the public.
- Disclosing
concealment, or likely concealment, of any of the above.
2. There
is a public interest in freedom of expression itself.
3. The
regulator will consider the extent to which material is already in the public
domain or will become so.
4.
Editors invoking the public interest will need to demonstrate that they
reasonably believed publication - or journalistic activity taken with a view to
publication – would both serve, and be proportionate to, the public interest
and explain how they reached that decision at the time.
5. An
exceptional public interest would need to be demonstrated to over-ride the
normally paramount interests of children under 16.
Findings
of the Committee
14. The
Committee noted firstly that the articles had been based on a video that had
been widely shared online without being pixelated, including on a Facebook
group with over 33,000 members. It considered, therefore, that the information
concerning the incident included in the articles was already established in the
public domain.
15. The
complaint under Clause 9 related to the images of the girls, which appeared in
both articles and in the publication’s Facebook post which linked to the second
article. The Committee noted that whilst the girls had not been victims of a
crime, they had witnessed what was being treated as a crime by police at the
time the articles were published, namely the arrest of the security guard
following the incident. The Committee found that, on this basis, the
publication was right to pay particular regard to their vulnerable position
when reporting on the incident, as required by the Code unless publication was
justified in the public interest.
16. The
publication had taken stills from the video which had been shared on social
media. It had taken care to obscure the identity of the girls when publishing
the images by pixelating their faces, despite the video having already been
made public to a large audience without being pixelated. In doing so, the
publication had satisfied the requirement to pay particular regard to the
vulnerable position of the complainant’s family member and there was no breach
of Clause 9.
17. The
complainant had also said her family member was distressed about returning to
school after the images had been shared on social media. The Committee noted
the publication’s position that the arrest of the security guard had come as a
result of the girls’ actions, but also that the girls had been removed from the
venue in a way that “some [people]” had claimed was “heavy handed”. The
Committee considered that the article therefore did report on a matter
involving at least one child’s welfare. However, where there was a widely shared
video in which the complainant’s family member appeared, the Committee did not
consider that the republication of stills from this video amounted to an
intrusion into her time at school given that it was unlikely that the pixelated
images, or the image where her face was turned away from the camera, would
identify her to anyone who was not already aware of her involvement in the
incident. There was no breach of Clause 6.
18. As
none of the above Clauses were breached, the Committee did not need to consider
whether there was a public interest defence justifying publication. It did,
however, wish to remind the publication that for such a defence to apply, the
public interest and the proportionality of the published information must be
considered at the time of publication.
19. With
regards to Clause 1, the video supplied by the publication clearly showed some
of the girls verbally abusing staff at the restaurant. In addition, the claim
that the girls had “assaulted” members of staff and a pregnant woman, which
were denied, had clearly been reported as allegations which had been made by
the newspaper’s source, and not as fact. There was, therefore, no breach of
Clause 1.
Conclusion(s)
20. The
complaint was not upheld.
Remedial
Action Required
21. N/A
Date
complaint received: 15/09/2022
Date complaint concluded by IPSO: 31/01/2023
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