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IPSO raps bi-weekly over police sergeant’s accuracy complaint

The press watchdog has rapped a bi-weekly newspaper after it misleadingly paraphrased comments made by a police sergeant.

The Independent Press Standards Organisation upheld a complaint made by Bruce Gray against the Inverness Courier over a story which claimed the police had admitted they were “wrong” to oppose the abolition of a midnight curfew on pubs and clubs.

Sgt Gray, who works in Police Scotland’s liquor and civic licensing department, was described in the article as having made the admission, stating the curfew’s removal hasn’t resulted in a notable increase or decrease in crime in Inverness city centre.

The story was trailed on the Courier’s front page, with the strapline ‘We were wrong’.

police tape

Complaining under Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice, Sgt Gray said the Courier had deliberately misquoted him and claimed that both the article and the front page strapline were inaccurate as he had not stated, that the police were “wrong” in supporting the curfew, instead he had said that “there was no notable increase or decrease in city centre crime” following the lifting of the curfew.

However, he believed this did not mean that the police were wrong because they had only ever claimed that lifting the curfew could, rather than would, increase crime.

In response, the Courier said that it had published a number of examples of senior officers saying that there “would” be an increase in crime if the curfew was lifted, and claimed that paraphrasing the complainant’s statement as an admission by the police that they were wrong, did not breach Clause 1.

The Courier said that although the article did not make clear that this was the newspaper’s characterisation, the article did not directly quote the complainant saying the police were wrong, and the statements were clearly attributed to the police, not the complainant.

However, it offered to publish a clarification.

IPSO emphasised the need for publishers to take particular care when paraphrasing speech attributed to a particular individual, because of the risk of misrepresentation or distortion.

It found that although other comments which had been made by the complainant were quoted accurately and at length within the article, in circumstances where the complainant did not make any admission that the police, nor himself, “were wrong”, this statement was considered significantly misleading.

The complaint was upheld, and the full adjudication can be read here.