Resolution Statement 13363-16 A woman v Mirror.co.uk

Decision: Resolved - IPSO mediation

Resolution Statement 13363-16 A woman v Mirror.co.uk

Summary of complaint

1. A woman, acting on behalf of her daughter, complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation that Mirror.co.uk breached Clause 2 (Privacy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice in an article headlined “Domestic violence victim reduces tormentor to tears with emotional court statement revealing how he ‘broke her into pieces’”, published on 8 November 2016.

2. The complainant expressed concern that the publication had accompanied an article, which reported that her daughter’s former partner had been sentenced to four years in prison for domestic violence, with photographs that had been taken from her daughter’s Facebook profile without permission.

3. The publication said that an agency had supplied the article, and it had confirmed that the images were taken from a Facebook profile which was open to the public. It said that when it received the complainant’s request for the images to be removed, it had done so immediately.

Relevant Code provisions

4. 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.

Mediated outcome

5. The complaint was not resolved through direct correspondence between the parties. IPSO therefore began an investigation into the matter.

6. The publication confirmed that it had already deleted the article from its website.

7. The complainant said that as the article had been taken down, the matter was resolved.

8. As the complaint was successfully mediated, the Complaints Committee did not make a determination as to whether there had been any breach of the Code.

Date complaint received: 18/11/16
Date complaint concluded by IPSO: 06/03/17

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