The press watchdog has upheld a complaint against a regional daily for publishing an unpixellated photograph of an 11-year-old girl standing over her injured sister.

The picture was taken by a member of the Derby Telegraph staff who was passing the scene of an accident and was subsequently published on the paper’s website, though not in print.

The injured girl, whose face was pixellated in the picture, had been hit by a car and her sister was waiting with others for the emergency services to arrive at the scene.

However the uninjured child’s face was unpixellated and the mother of the two girls complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation under Clause 3 (Privacy), Clause 5 (Intrusion into grief or shock) and Clause 6 (Children).

She said that the use of the photograph had added to the family’s distress over the incident and that although it took place in public, a photograph relating to the welfare of her children should not have been published without her consent.

The Telegraph immediately removed the image from its site, offered to remove the article from its site and to write a private letter of apology to her.

The newspaper argued said there was a public interested in publishing both the image and story due to an ongoing campaign by residents in the area the incident took place for the speed limit to be reduced, and that it had not been able to contact the family as the child’s name had not been released at the time.

However the regulator upheld the complaint on all three grounds.

The IPSO committee found that parental consent should have been sought for publication of the photograph, that the newspaper had failed to explain how its publication had contributed to the public interest element of the story and that the injured child had a reasonable expectation of privacy.

In its ruling, it stated: “Although the newspaper had pixellated the face of the injured child and had contacted the ambulance services to try to ascertain the severity of the injury, the publication of the photograph at a time when the newspaper had not been able to verify the identity of the child concerned or establish whether her parents had been informed of the incident represented a failure to handle publication with appropriate sensitivity.

“The photograph had been distressing for the family, and risked notifying friends and relatives about the accident.”

The committee also welcomed the Telegraph’s attempts to address the complainant’s concerns once they had been aired but ordered the text of its adjudication to be published in full on the newspaper’s website and linked to the homepage for a minimum of 24 hours.

It ruled the adjudication should then be archived and its terms searchable on the website.

The adjudication can be read in full here.