Attorney-General accused of “shocking overreach” after warning editors their stories could prejudice any criminal trial.
More to the point, wrote veteran Times crime reporter Sean O’Neill in anin the paper on Monday, the contempt of court rules cited by Prentis do not yet apply in the Brand case.
“Anyone with even the sketchiest knowledge of how the media works surely knows that every single word of reporting on Brand has been rigorously scrutinised before publication. And one of the many things looked at is whether there is a contempt issue,” O’Neill wrote. “As a journalist for more than 35 years, I have always understood that contempt of court “bites” when proceedings are active . There have been no arrests in this case. No one has been interviewed by detectives. There are no active proceedings that can be prejudiced. The attorney-general is either poorly informed about the law of contempt or has taken it upon herself to issue a thinly veiled threat intended to have a chilling effect on reporting of the Brand allegations.
The issue at stake for reporters on what was once known as Fleet Street goes far beyond coverage of the allegations against Russell Brand. In the glory days of the U.K. press, pre-internet, local newspapers would have had reporters in virtually every courtroom to provide a written record for the community of the trials therein. That was their main job.
Nowadays, with the exception of more high-profile criminal cases, reporters have to insist or negotiate access to criminal trials; a veil of secrecy has descended as judges come down on the side of “privacy” over press freedom and oligarchs throw their cash around to threaten editors with potentially ruinous criminal trials.writer O’Neill put it: “The freedom to report on crime and policing is under sustained attack.
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