What happened to innocent until proved guilty?

PLEASE can the Press refrain from posting articles stating that a named person is charged with an offence and then follow up later by stating the case against the person who is again named has been dropped due to lack of evidence by the prosecution. This has been a continual feature.

In a small island such as ours the damage is done and the innocent person’s character is tarnished.

Please wait until a case is proved before reporting anything.

NAME AND ADDRESS SUPPLIED

Editor James Falla responds: I thank the author for their letter and to give us the opportunity to explain reporting of court.

I understand that reporting court proceedings can give rise to strong feelings. The Independent Press Standards Organisation (Ipso) says the following about court reporting: ‘Newspapers routinely report what happens in court as part of making sure justice happens fairly. It is important that the public is told about what happens in court, so that they can see justice in action. This is commonly known as "open justice".' We uphold this approach.

Almost every local and regional newspaper which covers court will pick up on cases from the accused’s first appearance in court, or even earlier, when an individual has been charged. We take a slightly different approach, but generally from the point when a plea is entered in the Magistrate’s Court, we will report on proceedings and do so until they have concluded with a guilty or not guilty verdict.

We appreciate that sometimes proceedings are dropped along the way. On almost every occasion we have no idea that such a course might be taken. If that does happen, we correctly report that proceedings against the accused have been withdrawn, and that the individual is not guilty of any offence.

It would be wrong for us to ignore a case until conclusion. Taking this argument to its logical conclusion, if the accused was found not guilty, it would then be ‘wrong’ to report that case. And that could be a case of major interest across the island.