Leveson: 'lack of dignity and respect' for celebrities and victims of intrusion

 
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Lord Justice Leveson today damned the press for showing a “lack of dignity and respect” to celebrities and other victims of intrusion

The judge accused the media of an “unethical cultural indifference” to the consequences of exposing private lives.

He singled out the treatment of singer Charlotte Church, Harry Potter author JK Rowling, millionaire Max Mosley, schoolteacher Christopher Jefferies and the parents of Madeleine McCann and Milly Dowler.

The 2,000-page report said Church was the subject of “intense press scrutiny” from the age of 12.

She told the inquiry how she was doorstepped and “stalked” by the press and paparazzi, who installed a secret camera in her garden hedge.

Of Rowling, he said newspapers showed a “casual disregard of her desire to protect her children’s privacy” when she shot to global fame with her books.

The report highlighted how photographers gathered outside her house and pursued her family at home and abroad.

Lord Leveson reserved his strongest criticism for the treatment of the family of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler when she went missing in 2002.

The report stated unequivocally that the News of the World had hacked her phone, which “rightly shocked the public conscience in a way that other stories of phone-hacking may not have”.

It added: “It gave momentum to growing calls for light to [be] shed on [an] unethical and unlawful practice of which there were literally thousands of victims.”

Lord Justice Leveson touched upon the error by the Guardian newspaper over whether News of the World reporters had deleted voicemail messages on Milly’s phone which gave “false hope” to her parents.

The report said the revelation over the hacking had led to the exposure of unlawful practices on a huge scale which meant that “whether or not NoW journalists had caused the ‘false hope’ moment is almost irrelevant”.

Mark Lewis, lawyer for the Dowlers, said he had “considered optimism” about the report.

He said: “We have to see whether the Prime Minister is going to be a statesman and implement it.”

He added that the Dowlers were “going to want to look at this in more detail.”

He added: “They want to ensure that the same sort of thing does not happen to anyone else.”

Former Formula 1 boss Max Mosley, who successfully sued the News Of The World for privacy damages over claims that he was involved in a "sick Nazi orgy", said it would be "astonishing" if the Government did not implement Lord Justice Leveson's recommendations.

He said: "It certainly is a very thorough document and it's in many respects better than one could have hoped.

"It would make the situation much better than it is now and what he has done is more or less give the press what the Hunt-Black proposals would want, but underpinning with a statutory to make sure there's no backsliding and no cheating.

"The only real omission is that if you want to stop something coming out because you find that they are going to breach your privacy, you would still have to go to court to do that, which of course is very expensive.

"I think it would be astonishing if the politicians didn't implement the report because no responsible politician could allow the current situation to continue."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in