Solicitors acting for a 17-year-old boy abandoned their battle to make his identity secret, when the judge revealed that he agreed with the North West Evening Mail – that the youth should be named.

The teenager, Daniel Green, of Hartington Street, Dalton, had committed more than 80 crimes and had been dealt with by magistrates handing him an anti social behaviour order.

But he had broken the order and the Mail had won a court bid to name him – so that people would know if he went on to break the law again.

Magistrates agreed with the newspaper but Green’s solicitors tried to get a higher court to overturn a decision by Furness magistrates that he could be named.

The appeal at Preston Crown Court was unsuccessful, when the application was withdrawn after Judge Peter Openshaw said he took the same view as the Mail.

Editor Steve Brauner said afterwards: “We are pleased that the courts have upheld the Evening Mail’s right to name Daniel Green, the first boy in south Cumbria to be the subject of an anti-social behaviour order.

“The key point of the order was that Green could be arrested if he was spotted in a situation where he might be about to commit a crime, such as entering premises without authority or hanging around late at night with youths on street corners.

“It is highly unlikely that these aspects of the order would ever be enforced if no one knew Green’s name or what he looked like.

“That is why it was necessary to publish his name and photograph.”

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