Mr Alan Dignam and the Sunday World

The Press Ombudsman has decided to uphold a complaint by Mr Alan Dignam that an article published in the Sunday World on 10 June 2012 was in breach of Principle 7 (Court Reporting) of the Code of Practice for Newspapers and Magazines.

Mr Dignam complained that the article, which  reported on two criminal court cases in which he had been a defendant, had inaccurately stated that he had been sent to jail, and that the publication had not subsequently reported – despite having been made aware of the fact – that his convictions in each of the cases had been successfully appealed.

Principle 7 of the Code of Practice requires publications to strive to ensure that court reports are fair and accurate.   Mr Dignam supplied satisfactory evidence that, although he had been sentenced to a term of imprisonment on each occasion, he had not been jailed, given his successful subsequent appeals.  In these circumstances, reporting that the complainant had been “sent to jail” in relation to a District Court sentence in 2010, and that a judge had “jailed Dignam” in relation to a District Court sentence in 2008, was sufficiently inaccurate, in the opinion of the Press Ombudsman,  to warrant a decision that  the article had breached Principle 7 of the Code.

It is not always practicable for a publication to familiarise itself on a continuing basis with the outcome of a successful appeal against a criminal conviction it has previously reported,  not least because appeals are frequently subject to indeterminate delays. Nonetheless, the stated need for  fairness in court reporting in Principle 7, in the opinion of the Press Ombudsman, also requires publications to complete appropriately their coverage of relevant judicial proceedings  after a successful appeal against a guilty verdict which they previously reported has been brought to their attention.

The Press Ombudsman decided that the newspaper had taken sufficient remedial action to resolve a further complaint, and a number of other complaints were not upheld.

Mr Dignam complained about a statement in the article that he had punched a witness after chasing him into a furniture store. Although this allegation had been made in a statement to Gardaí by a witness in the case shortly after the incident giving rise to the 2010 charges, the complainant provided a transcript to show that it had effectively been withdrawn by the witness concerned during cross-examination in the course of the trial. The Press Ombudsman decided that, in these circumstances, an offer by the newspaper to publish a clarification of this matter constituted sufficient remedial action on its part to resolve the complaint.

A complaint about the accuracy of a reference in the article to the complainant resembling “a cage fighter” was not upheld, as this description of him was in quotation marks, indicating clearly that it was a quotation from evidence given in court in the 2010 case.

The Press Ombudsman also decided that the evidence available to him was insufficient to support a decision that the article concerned was in other respects  in breach of Principles 1 (Truth and Accuracy), 2  (Distinguishing Fact and Comment), 3 (Fairness and Honesty), 4 (Respect for Rights) or 7 (Court Reporting).

The complainant also raised a number of other matters relating to publication of material about his father. Since this material related to another named individual and not to the complainant, the Press Ombudsman was not in a position to consider this part of the complaint.

9 May 2013

The newspaper appealed the Press Ombudsman’s decision to the Press Council of Ireland.