Media Law - Code of Conduct in brief

In this session we learned about the four different codes of conduct for journalists:

1. The NUJ Code of Conduct
2. The Ofcom Code of Conduct
3. The Editor's Code of Conduct
4. The BBC Code of Conduct

The codes are not legally binding, but if you agree to them then it is assumed that you will uphold them at all times.
The National Union of Journalists (NUJ) Code of Conduct

The NUJ code of conduct has fourteen codes:

1. Journalists must work to a high professional standard.
2. Defend the freedom of the press - work to eliminate censorship/suppression of the press.
3. Journalists must try to make reports fair and accurate.
4. Journalists must rectify any harmful inaccuracies.
5. Journalists must obtain photos/information by straightforward means.
6. Journalists must not report on private distress/grief.
7. Journalists must protect confidential sources.
8. Journalists must not accept bribes.
9. Journalists must not distort/suppress the truth because of advertising.
10. Journalists must only mention sex/age/race/religion if it is strictly relevant.
11. Journalists must not interview/photograph children without permission.
12. Journalists must not publish photographs which have been manipulated without identifying them as such.
13. Journalists must not take private advantage of information.
14. Journalists must not endorse by advertising any products.

The NUJ Code of Conduct are created by journalists for journalists. Today it is not a requirement for journalists to agree to the NUJ code of conduct, or even to be members of the NUJ. Previously though if a journalist was not a member of the NUJ then no one would ever hire them. Conversely, journalists who work for Murdoch publications are not allowed to be members of the NUJ, and if they are then they will be fired. Presumably this is because Murdoch wants journalists who will find or create stories by any means necessary, not only by straight forwards means (number 5

The Ofcom Code of Conduct applies to commercial television, for example Sky and ITV. The BBC Code of Conduct only applies for BBC establishments. It is taught at the BBC college of journalism and is also available online.

Journalists working for any Murdoch publication follow the Editor's Code of Conduct, which was established after Murdoch first broke down unions. This meant that there was no code of conduct for a while which resulted in unreliable and irresponsible journalism. Today, if you break the Editor's Code of Conduct then you will be sacked without any compensation.

Media Law Lecture - 09/11/10

The topic of today's media law lecture was investigative journalism. Investigative journalism is when, rather than reporting on well publicised news, journalists go out of their way to find stories that have not been reported or made public for various reasons; the journalist creates the news. Investigative journalism, I would imagine, is quite challenging work but it must be very rewarding when you are able to report on something that the rest of the world had no idea was happening. There have been cases in where investigative journalists have uncovered incredibly scandalous stories and have been able to make a real difference.

It is thought that Emile Zola (2/4/1840 - 29/9/1902) was the founder of investigative journalism. He risked his entire career in order to try and prove that Alfred Dreyfus, accused of spying for the Germans, was innocent. Zola wrote an article entitled 'J'accuse...! Lettre au President de la Rebublique.' (I accuse.. A letter to the President of the Republic.) The letter was published on the front of the daily paper L'Aurore on January 13th 1898. This was very risky for Zola because it meant he was publicly claiming that Dreyfus had been framed by French officials. He was convicted of criminal libel, but rather than face jail he went into hiding in England. The case is thought to be one of the first instances of investigative journalism.

Two of the most famous investigative journalists are Robert Woodward and Carl Bernstein who were the journalists behind the Watergate scandal. On the 17th of June 1972 five men broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters. Evidence showed a link between the five men and the President at the time, Richard Nixon. Woodward and Bernstein took it upon themselves to find out what the story really was behind Watergate; what they found out shocked the nation. They found out that Nixon recorded almost all the conversations that he had because he suffered from paranoia. They managed to get hold of the tapes and came across a conversation in which Nixon could clearly be heard discussing how to cover up the Watergate scandal.

Woodward and Bernstein publicised their findings, revealing Nixon as a liar and a crook. This was, of course, incredibly embarrassing to Nixon. He was the first, and so far only, President to resign. It is an incredible achievement of the two journalists who single handedly shamed the President of the United States and forced him to resign.

The story of Woodward and Bernstein is legendary and was even made into a film called "All the President's men" starring Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford.

I first saw this film when I was about 10 years old and I have to admit it bored me mindless. As I learned about the Watergate scandal as part of my history course at school I decided to watch the film again; I loved it. Since then I have seen the film over 10 times and I am fascinated every time I watch it. I think that the story is incredibly inspiring, and is one of the things which sparked my interest in journalism.  

Another high profile where investigative journalists have been able to make a difference by rev

The effect of Thalidomide

ealing  scandal is in the Thalidomide case. Thalidomide was a sedative drug which was prescribed to many pregnant women in the 1960s who suffered from morning sickness. At the time Harry Evans was the editor of the Sunday Times and he had a team of highly successful investigative journalists, referred to as 'The Insight Team'. The Insight Team researched Thalidomide because they thought that they could prove that it caused birth defects in the children of women who had taken the drug. They proved their theory to be true and Thalidominde.

Again this case proves the power of investigative journalism. Without the Insight Team the effects of Thalidomide may have taken years and years longer, or perhaps never have been discovered.

Journalism can also be used to publicise stories in cases where justice has not been served accurately or at all. Take, for example, the case of the Omagh bombings. At the time the police were unable to charge anyone for causing the bombings, even though policemen on either side of the Irish boarder claimed to be certain as to who was responsible. They were not able to charge the suspected arsonist because they did not have any evidence that would show beyond reasonable doubt who was responsible. The police took the case to the BBC investigative show Panorama. Journalist, John Ware, investigated the case and exposed those responsible on the Panorama show in October of 2000. After being proved guilty on the programme, although it was not proven in a court of law, the RIRA retaliated by bombing the BBC. The five men who were responsible for this retaliation were arrested and sentenced to between 16 and 22 years in jail.

The Omagh case shows how investigative journalism can be used not only to expose atrocities, by also to make sure justice is served on those who are guilty but were not found guilty in a court of law. A similar situation happened was the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993. After a £30 million court case, five men were cleared of the murder of Stephen Lawrence, even though the police, and majority of the population knew that the men were part of a racist group and that it was incredibly likely that it was them. However, once proven innocent in a court of law, individuals cannot be charged for the same offence again, and so there was no possibility of justice being served on the men. It is incredibly defamatory to call someone a murderer when they have been proven innocent, and any journalist who does so will be suseptible to a libel case against them.

In 1997 The Daily Mail printed this on their front cover:

All five of the men pictured had been proven innocent, however the Mail still positively identified them as the murderers stating "If we are wrong, let them sue us". This very public defamation of the men was an incredibly bold move by the Mail, which was applauded by the population. None of the five men sued the Mail, and their decision not to sue, in a way, proved to the public that they were guilty of the murder.

Investigative journalism can not only be used to expose those who have broken the law, it can also identify individuals who are going to commit crimes in the future. This was true in the case of the Secret Policeman. The Secret Policeman was a programme on Panorama in which journalist Mark Daly went undercover in a police academy to try to expose a trainee policeman who was a racist. As part of the investigation Daly needed to use subterfuge in order to gather evidence against the corrupt policeman. He used a hidden camera and was able to capture video evidence of the man admitting that he only joined the police force so that he would be able to accuse black people of crimes they did not commit.

Subterfuge is a risky method for a journalist to use and there are certain restrictions on when it can be used as a method of research:

1. It must be the only way to obtain the information
2. It must be in the public interest
3. It must be carried out under the permission of the head office - for example Ofcom.

If a journalist does not have permission then they are not able to use subterfuge, even if it is the only way to get the information and is n the public interest.

I think that investigative journalism is a risky, but ultimately worthwhile career because the possibilities are endless and you could end up exposes an injustice or cover a story that no one has ever covered before.

Media Law Lecture - 02/11/10

Today the media law lecture was about copyright, and the importance of obeying copyright laws. The 1911 Copy right Act made stealing intellectual property illegal.

This was particularly important in the 18th century, when the invention of the printing press meant that intellectual property could be printed and distributed. It also meant that people would not only be able to read the work of others, but that they could then reprint that work as their own. For example, Daniel De Foe was produced pamphlets, newspapers and essays on mass so it was important that we was able to protect his intellectual property from people who might want to steal it.

It is not possible to copyright an idea, it is only possible to copyright actual work. Take for example, this theoretical situation:

• I have an idea for a chocolate bar that would make people lose weight
• Someone else creates the chocolate bar using all the ingredients I was planning to use
• I would have no right at all to take any action against the people who made the chocolate bar before me because all I had was an idea.
• If I had actually created the chocolate bar, or even written a recipe for it before the other person created it, then legally I would have the copyright to the chocolate, and would be able take legal action against the other individual.

It would however, be possible to sell the rights to your work. Foe example, I could sell the chocolate recipe for a lump sum of money. Once you have received money fr the work then the work no longer belongs to you. So if the person I sold the recipe to went on to make a huge amount of money from it, I would not be entitled to any of the profits because the recipe would no longer belong to me.

If I wanted to keep ownership of the rights of my work then I could make a license agreement. This would mean that I would allow someone to pay to use my recipe once for a sum of money. If they then used it more than once then I could sue them for breach of copyright because the recipe would still belong to me. I could also sell my recipe but retain the royalties. This would mean that if someone made a lot of money using my recipe, then I would be entitled to part of the profit made for as long as a profit was being made.

If you a journalist for a paper then you are paid a wage for your work. This means that as soon as you receive money for your work then you no longer have anything to do with the work. Even if it makes a lot of money then that money would belong to the bosses of the newspaper, and you would not be entitled to any of i because you already exchanged the work for a sum of money.However, if you are a freelance journalist then you could sell the work for the newspaper to once, but you would still have copyright of the work and could then sell it to other newspapers to make more of a profit. So ultimately it would be beneficial to be a freelance journalist, as long as you produced work that was valuable!

It is possible to create something based on someones work, but unless you actually steal the exact work then no copyright laws are broken. A famous example of this are the Barry Trotter books written by Micheal Gerber, which are parodies of the Harry Potter books by J.K Rowling.

Greber writes about the adventures of Barry Trotter, Lon Measly and Ermine Cringer at the Hogwash school of wizadry and witchcrap. These are blatantly taken from J.K Rowling's books about Harry Potter, Ron Weasly and Hermione Granger at the Hogwarts school of wizadry and witchcraft. While it is clear to see the similarities, Greber only used Rowling's idea, not her work and so Rowling was not able to take any legal action against him. Hundreds of other parodies have made about the Harry Potter series from book to episodes of the Simpsons, but none of these breach copyright laws.

The Simpsons is an American cartoon which frequently uses the ideas of other people, without actually using their work. However, there are times when they actually do use the work, and in these cases they have to pay often huge amounts of money to use such work. The clip below is the introduction to season 21, episode 20 of The Simpsons:



The song being played is "Tick Tock" by Ke$ha, and is incredibly popular and recognisable. The fact that the actual song is used in The Simpsons means that the producers must have paid Ke$ha for the song. Below is a parody of "Tick Tock", the lyrics are different, but the music is the same. However, the song has become a sensation in itself, and the creators were not charged for breaching copyright laws:



This parody has become famous and has had nearly 9 million hits on YouTube, as well as being distributed as a ring tone, and is available to purchase on itunes. The creators of the parody have been able to make an incredible amount of money by taking Ke$ha's idea.

There is a loophole in copyright laws, which allows work to be stolen, as long as it is being reviewed. For example, if a student had to review a clip from a film, then they would be allowed to show that clip as part of their review without having to pay royalties to the producers.

As part of my A-level media studies course we had to make a music video. We were encouraged to use songs from the website www.unsigned.co.uk because we would not have to pay any money to the producers of the music. We were also allowed to take songs from signed artists, on the condition that we e-mailed the producers first and requested permission to use the song free of charge. We received this permission, but on the condition that we only put the video onto our A-level media blogs, and not any where else on the internet. We were told that if we did put our video any where else on the internet then we would be heavily fined.

People who do steal music/videos that are copyright can be heavily fined. An example of this is the case of 25 year old, Boston University student Joel Tenenbaum. In 2009, Tenenbaum was fined $675,000 for illegally downloading and sharing songs. This was only the second high profile case of this kind, but they are bound to become more frequent. Websites such as Limewire allowed people to easily download hundreds of songs for free, and very few people ever considered the implications of their actions; but I am sure that record producers will eventually fine everyone who has illegally downloaded their music.

Breaching copyright laws is a very serious crime, and hundreds of people across the world have been heavily fined for stealing other people's work. At the end of the day it is always best to make sure that you have paid for work that is not your own!

Meida Law Lecture - 25/10/10

The topic of the lecture today was confidentiality. We discussed the main types of confidentiality and looked at some examples of when confidentiality has been an issue.

One of the cases where confidentiality is essential is when dealing with "state secrecy". Practically any information about the government is considered confidential. The Official Secrets Act 1911 defines exactly what is confidential. Section One states that is illegal to release any states secrets which could be potentially damaging to society, such as the location of British troops. Section Two states that ANY information regarding the state is confidential, even seemingly trivial pieces of information, for example menus. If a journalist is found guilty of revealing any of these confidential pieces of information then they will be breaking criminal law.

As well as criminal law, there is also civil law. Civil law confidentiality refers to commercial secrets. For example, if an employee of Coca Cola revealed the secret ingredient to a journalist then the employee would be breaking commercial confidentiality. If the journalist then released the information to anyone then they would be guilty of third party breach.

It could be argued that the journalist is not really at fault, but the journalist must protect the source if questioned who gave them the information, in accordance with the journalist code. In a case where the journalist refuses to reveal the identity of the source then Coca Cola could take the issue to a judge and the journalist could be issued a court order commanding them to reveal the source. If the journalist then continues to protect the source, then they will be in contempt of court and could be heavily fined or even jailed.

One case where the journalist did not protect the source is the case of Sarah Tisdall in 1983. Miss Tisdall, a Ministry of Defence employee, gave information about when nuclear weapons would be arriving in the UK; and the the Guardian printed the information. While the documents themselves were found to be a threat, it was believed that if there was a worker who release them then it means they might release more dangerous information, and so a court order was issued for the journalist to reveal the source. The journalist refused to reveal the source.

However, the Ministry of Defence demanded that the papers be returned. The editor of the Guardian, Peter Preston, returned the documents. From the font on the document the MoD was able to trace Sarah Tisdall as the source. She was sentenced to six months in jail, and served four. If Peter Preston had destroyed the documents instead of handing them back the he would have protected the source, and it may have been possible that Sarah Tisdall would never have been found out.

There have also been cases where the source has been protected, even when the consequences have been potentially disastrous for the journalist. One such case is the Bill Goodwin case.

Goodwin was a journalist for The Engineer, and received information that a company called Tetra was selling faulty products. Goodwin published the information and Tetra went bust. Goodwin received a court order to reveal the source; he protected the source, refusing to give any information. The case was taken to court and Goodwin was again ordered to reveal the source, claiming that it was in the interest of justice.

Goodwin refused and appealed, but again was given the same outcome. He took the case to the house of Lords, who again demanded that he reveal the source, and he faced a potential 30 years in jail. Eventually Goodwin was able to take his case to the European court of civil rights, who agreed that he did not need to reveal the source. To this day the source has not been revealed and this case proves the extraordinary lengths that Goodwin went to in order to protect his source.

There are cases where journalists accidentally break confidentiality laws. The most common way in which these laws are broken are by journalists using general views (GVs).
For example, a camera man may be filming a government building without thinking that this is breaking a confidentiality law, when in actual fact they would be.

There are 4 main qualities which make something confidential:

1. If it has the quality of confidentiality
2. If it has been told in a situation which implies confidentiality.
3. If no permission has been given to make the information public.
4. If it is going to cause detriment.

In theory if a journalist asks themselves these four questions about everything which might be confidential then they will not end up landing themselves in trouble!

A case in the news at the moment which is a good example for confidentiality is the case of Lilly Allen having a miscarriage 6 months into her pregnancy. This story has been widely covered in the papers, on television, online and on the radio.

In a normal circumstance, this information would be incredibly confidential. It has the quality of confidence because it is a serious medical issue. It would also have been discussed in a situation implying confidentiality, as it would have presumably been discussed between Miss Allen and a doctor. It could also cause detrament because it could affect the life of Miss Allen because it is a very private and emotional matter.

The reason that it has been able to be reported is because Lilly Allen must have given permission. We know this because the information was told to the media by her publicist, and so she must have allowed it to be released. The fact that she gave permission means that she will not now be able to back track and sue for a breach of confidentiality - once she gave her permission, her story belonged to the media. The only way that she would be able to sue is if she never gave her publicist permission to release the story, although this is incredibly unlikely!

Technically, this story had 3 of the 4 qualities which would have made it confidential, however because one of the qualities of confidentiality had been removed it means that the other qualities are irrelevant, and the information is no longer confidential.

Journalists need to be 100% sure that the stories they report are not confidential otherwise they are likely to be sued, and will more than likely lose the case, pobably resulting in them losing their job.

Media Law lecture notes - 19/10/10

In the lecture today we briefly recapped on what the three defences against libel are:

1. Justification - is it true and more importantly can you prove it?
2. Fair Comment - is it simply the someones opinion and not presented as fact?
3. Privilege

The lecture primarily focused on the third defence. There are two types of privilege - statutory and qualified.

If a person has statutory privilege it means they are exempt from any libel laws and are effectively allowed to say whatever they want. The Queen is a prime example of a person who possesses statutory privilege. Members of parliament also have statutory privilege, as it is viewed that they are in theory the voice of the people and so should be allowed to say whatever they need/want to express.

Journalists have a qualified privilege. This means that they are able to report on certain events without being subject to libel laws. For example, it means that they are able to report on a story once it has been through the court. This privilege is given as journalists are thought to act as the eyes and ears for the general public and it would be ludicrous to expect every member of the public to attend court cases, so instead they are able to obtain the facts through the media.

A recent example of when a journalist can report a story under a qualified privilege is the case of the murder of shopkeeper Gurmail Singh, 63.

Muawaz Khalid, 20, and Nabeel Shafi, 18, guilty of murder on the 21st of October 2010. Sky news online reported on this case (link to article below)

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20101021/tuk-two-men-found-guilty-of-shopkeeper-m-45dbed5.html

If Khalid and Shafi had not been found guilty when sky news released this article, then the journalist who wrote it could have been sued for libel. This is because until the men were found guilty, a journalist would not have been able to print anything stating that they had been the murderers as this would have been defamitory to the men.

If this had happened before the verdict then the journalist would not be able to make a defence for libel because they would not have been able to prove it true beyond reasonable doubt, they would no have been able to pass it off as fair comment, and they could not have used privilege because it had not been judged in court yet.

However, because they were found guilty in a court of law it meant that the journalist was able to use their qualified privilege and print the fact that the men had been found guilty. The journalist would have been able to print details of the case before the verdict using qualified privilege as long as they made it clear that the case was still ongoing.

The issue of qualified privilege was at the forefront of a case in which The Sunday Times newspaper was sued for libel by Albert Reynolds. The judge in this case devised a 10 point test which he claimed, if followed, would allow any journalist to be completely sure as to the situations in which their qualified privilege can be a defence.

The link below shows the official document written by the judge in which the ten point test is outlined:

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld199899/ldjudgmt/jd991028/rey01.htm

The 10 points to consider are:

1. The seriousness of the allegation.
2. The nature of the information.
3. The source of information.
4. The steps taken to verify information.
5. The status of the information.
6. The urgency of the matter.
7. Comment sought from claimant.
8. The claimants response.
9. The tone of the article.
10. Timing.

If all of the above 10 points are considered then the journalist will be "safe".

Media Law

Reporting in court

There are three basic legal principles:

1. People are to be presumed innocent until proven guilty
2. The public has the right to know about trials taking place, unless there is a very good reason for the trial not to be public (eg protecting the victim, rape, child abuse).
3. The right for a jury to come to a conclusion based on evidence.

There are three key figures in criminal court:

1. Jury - a group of citizens who decide whether or not a person is innocent or guilty based on the evidence presented in court.
2. Barrister - it is the barristers job to prove "beyond reasonable doubt" that their client is innocent.
3. Judge - keeps the court orderly and advises the jury on legal matters.

Contempt of Court Act 1981

The contempt of court act was introduced to make make sure that individuals and organizations respect the power of the court. For example, if a person was to disobey an order which had been given to them in court then they would be in contempt of court. The contempt of court act banned anyone, including journalists from doing the following things:

• Reporting on any views expressed by anyone on the jury
• Publishing anything which might disrupt a fair trial
• Interfering with the course of justice
• Breaching a court order

The only things which a journalist is allowed to report on are the following:

• Name and age
• Address
• Occupation
• Any charges made
• The date and place of a Crown Court hearing
• Name of counsel
• Any bail and legal conditions

When reporting on Crown Court cases, a journalist is protected against libel with qualified privilege. Qualified privilege allows a journalist to report on a case as long as their report is, fast, fair and accurate. If the report is not fast, accurate or fair then the journalist is no longer protected by qualified privilege. (see Media Law notes 19/10/10)

My visit to the law court in Winchester

Today I went to the law court in Winchester. I was very impressed with the court building itself, although this maybe because I come from a small island will a tiny court building! Upon entering the building, everyone has to pass a security guard and walk through a metal detector. This is because it is illegal to being any weapons or recording/photographic equipment into the court. I immediately noticed how quiet the building was, as how respectful everyone was. People only talked in whispers and everyone was dressed very smartly. I found this quite unnerving because I was worried that I might inadvertently do something too noisy or disrespectful!

I watched parts of two different cases from the public gallery, both of which were murder trials.

The first case I watched was about a murder, and was in its third trial. I was able to see the doctor explain the injuries of the victim in great detail. I found some of what he was saying to be quite surprising and found myself rather amazed at how much he was able to learn about the attack simply from studying the body. For example, he was able to tell the court that the deceased had not tried to defend themself because there were no wounds to the hands or arms. I find it fascinating that we are able to learn so much about the event from the smallest clues.

In this trial they also presented the murder weapons. Again, I found this to be both shocking and intriguing. While I was alarmed at the size of the weapons, I found that I was pleased I had seen them because it helped me to piece together what had happened, even though I knew very little about the case.

The second case I watched was the first trial of the murder case and the witnesses were being questioned.

The first witness was a man who was dressed casually, and talking very aggressively to the lawyer questioning him. I thought this to be very disrespectful given the circumstances, and immediately I was reminded of the statement that the smartly dressed doctor had given in the previous case. When the doctor was giving answers I took them to be complete fact, purely because they were being told by a doctor, and I, like most of society, believe doctors to be honourable and trustworthy people. Conversely, I found myself doubting what the witness in the second trial was saying simply based on the fact that he was scruffy and rude.

Clearly this is very wrong of me to be so stereotypical and the witness probably was telling the truth but I did doubt everything that he was saying! I should also not have been so quick to accept what the doctor was saying simply because he is a doctor. Harold Shipman was a doctor, and clearly was not someone who could be trusted - so what proof did I have that the doctor was in fact telling the truth? I then realised how difficult it must be for the judge and jury to come to conclusions when they don't know who to trust and have to make assumptions based on the information that people choose to tell them.

The second witness in the trial was an older man, who was living off benefits. I have to shamefully admit that when I heard he was on benefits I immediately assumed that he was probably lying about his ill health in order to have an easy life on the dole. My view is more than likely the result of so much media coverage exposing benefit thieves, and proves how influential the media can be in influencing the opinions of the public. I thought that I was quite open minded and treated people equally, but today has made me aware of the prejudices that I have, so hopefully I will try harder not to jump to conclusions in the future! It is of course essential that a journalist is never bias in cases such as these, so that is something I must remember for the future.

I was quite surprised that I had not been told by any official not to discuss the cases in detail to anyone, because I assume that in the circumstances that the details must be confidential. Obviously I am aware that I should not discuss the cases in detail, but I definitely think that if the details are confidential, that members of the public need to be reminded of this when they leave the court as some people may not be so respectful of the confidential circumstances!

I did have a very interesting experience at the court and it definitely is something that I would be interested in doing again. It was useful because it has allowed me to understand more clearly what happens in cases such as the ones I saw, as well as making me think that court reporting is something I might like to do in the future.


Defamation

If a journalist reports something which is defamatory to an individual it means that it damages the individuals reputation and causes them to be shunned and avoided. For example, saying that someone is a murderer is defamatory to them because it would seriously damage their reputation. Similarly, claiming that a company is selling faulty products is defamatory to the company because no one would purchase anything from them.

Reputation is something which is important to all people, including celebrities. There have been many cases where a celebrity has been in a position where they are able to sue someone who has given information which could potentially damage their reputation.

Possibly the most high profile case of this in the news recently has been the allegations that David Beckham had an affair with $10,000 a night prostitute. This claim is incredibly defamatory to David Beckham, who continues to deny the charges. David Beckham intends to sue the prostitute, Irma Nici, for slander. He clearly has grounds for suing Nici because his global reputation as a family man has been defamed as well as his character and morals.

Remarkably Nici is counter-suing Beckham, claiming that he was denying her right to free speech.

I think that the difference between the two cases is quite clear. I think that Beckham has a perfectly valid reason to sue, because he has been defamed. On the other hand, I find it hard to believe that Nici will sue successfully because she has not really been defamed in any way as she has in fact bought it upon herself by releasing the story.

A journalist has three legal defences against libel:

1. Justification - it is true and can be proved.
2. Fair Comment  - it is only the opinion of the writer, not fact
3. Privilege.

In Chris' media law notes on defamation he states:

"...notorious pothead frog-lover Sir Paul McCartney, the arse-achingly boring billionaire scouce producer of sickly and brainless supermarket/hotel lift muzak rubbish.."

This description of Paul McCartney is incredibly defamatory to him, but Chris would have legal protection against libel. This is because these comments are clearly the opinion of the writer, not fact. Everyone has the right to express their opinions, so McCartney could not sue someone just because they don't like him!

There are cases in which it is not possible to defame a person, for example it is not possible to defame someone who is deceased. You may say something about them which other people will claim is defamatory to the dead person, but they would not have any grounds to sue you because the person, in the eyes of the law at least, no longer has a character and so can't be defamed.

There are also people who it is not possible to defame because their reputation is already so bad that nothing can make it worse. Hitler, for example, if he were alive could not be defamed by calling him a racist murderer, because facts are facts and his character would be so defamed already that it would not be possible to make the situation worse for him!

Ultimately, journalists need to be incredibly careful when commenting on any one's life because it could potentially lead to the defamation of that person. And whether the defamation was accidental or not, the individual who has been defamed would have the right to sue.