The Evening Standard has been cleared of any wrongdoing after it identified the father of a teenager convicted of attacking passengers on public transport.

The boy's father complained that his name, profession and country of origin had all been included in a story about the outcome of a court case involving his son and other members of a "steaming" gang.

He said that information was private and not relevant to the story, so claimed that the paper had breached Clause 9 (Reporting of crime) of the Code of Practice.

He accepted a private letter of apology, but also asked for it to be published in the Evening Standard - which the newspaper did not consider appropriate.

After investigating the complaint, the Press Complaints Commission rejected the man's claims because, as the newspaper had argued, he had not been the main focus of the article and had only been mentioned in passing, in reference to a family split.

The PCC also said that although the Code says relatives of people convicted or accused of crime should not "generally" be identified without their consent, there were circumstances where this would be acceptable, and this was one such case.

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