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for resolving complaints about the press

A Man and the Sunday World

By
Tuesday, 20th January 2009
Filed under:

Complaint

The man complained through his solicitors that an article published in the Sunday World breached Principle 2 (Distinguishing Fact and Comment) of the Code of Practice for Newspapers and Periodicals. The solicitors said that the thrust of the published material was that their client was party to a conspiracy to murder a named person, that he had given information to named third parties to facilitate this, and that naming their client represented a reckless threat to the life and limb of his dependent family. They further complained that a statement in the article that their client’s late brother had been charged with INLA membership and drug dealing was untrue.

The newspaper replied that all the references in the article to the complainant were clearly based on and attributed to a number of sources. It also stated that a witness in a criminal trial some time previously had given evidence of his belief that the complainant’s late brother had been a member of the INLA.

Decision

Principle 2 of the Code of Practice states that comment, conjecture, rumour and unconfirmed reports shall not be reported as if they were fact.

Consequently, where a comment, conjecture, rumour or unconfirmed report is attributed in an article to a source it does not present a breach of Principle 2 of the Code of Practice. In the article in question, all of the statements under complaint about the complainant, including statements contained in an earlier 2007 article about which he also complained, were clearly attributed to the newspaper’s sources of various kinds, and therefore are not a breach of Principle 2 of the Code of Practice.

The article stated that the complainant’s late brother had been charged with INLA membership and drug dealing. As the newspaper did not attribute this statement to any of its sources, confidential or otherwise, it was presented as a fact. As the newspaper was unable to provide evidence that the deceased had been so charged, this statement is a breach of Principle 2, and the complaint in that regard is therefore upheld.

20 January 2009