The press watchdog has backed a regional daily over an inaccurate claim that a convicted sex offender sent “explicit images of himself” to his victim.

The Liverpool Echo erroneously reported that Robert Leary had “sent [the woman] unsolicited explicit images of himself”, but the Independent Press Standards Organisation found this did not represent a significant inaccuracy in the context of its coverage of his crimes.

The Echo reported Leary had pleaded guilty to charges of computer misuse, harassment and sending indecent images, in relation to allegations that he sent “threatening and sexually explicit messages” after he hacked the victim’s Snapchat account and “downloaded private images of her in a state of undress”.

Leary had complained it was never mentioned in court that he had sent explicit images of himself to the woman in question, but IPSO dismissed his complaint after finding the impact on the victim of receiving the unsolicited image and threatening message would have been the same – regardless of who appeared in the image.

Complaining under Clause 1 (Accuracy), Clause 4 (Intrusion into shock or grief) and Clause 9 (Reporting of crime) of the Editors’ Code of Practice, Leary, pictured, admitted it was heard in court that he had sent the victim explicit images, but they were not of himself.

After being made aware of the complaint by IPSO, the Echo contacted the Crown Prosecution Service, which confirmed there was no evidence to suggest that the explicit images Leary had shared with his victim were of himself.

During the course of IPSO’s investigation, a correction was added by the newspaper to the story and relevant social media posts.

The watchdog found the Echo had inaccurately recorded what was heard in court, and had gone beyond what was heard during proceedings in making the assumption that the explicit images were of Leary.

However, the Committee considered the message which had accompanied the image was direct and personal, and the impact on the victim of receiving the unsolicited image and threatening message would have been the same, regardless of whether the image showed the complainant or another individual.

Whether the image showed the complainant or another individual was not significant in the context of his conviction, so IPSO did not consider that reporting that the image showed Leary rendered the story significantly inaccurate, distorted, or misleading, where the key focus of the article was the offences to which he entered guilty pleas and the impact his actions had had on the victim.

The complaint was not upheld, and the full adjudication can be read here.