Media law is ever changing and this index will strive to keep you abreast of developments in this complex and important area of journalism.
Our fortnightly column looking at the latest law issues, written by specialist media lawyers from Foot Anstey, also appears here.
It could soon be easier for regional newspapers to report on teenage tearaways charged with breaching anti-social behaviour orders. Automatic reporting restrictions still apply to such cases, despite a change in the law to allow the identification of under-18s who
A Leicester Mercury reporter has successfully challenged a judge who threw him out of a nuisance neighbour court hearing. District Judge Richard Merriman told Mercury reporter Tom Pegden to leave the court about 25 minutes into the case at Leicester
The Leatherhead Advertiser has won the right to name a problem teenager who shot at a child with plastic bullets – despite police hoping to keep his identity secret. Reporter Vikki Thomas successfully applied to overturn a Section 39 Order
A trainee reporter successfully blocked an application for a court order banning the identification of a two-year-old assault victim. Sundeep Kumar, who joined the Worcester Evening News last February, was at a court case in which a father was found
A district council has approved a regulation to block the press from taking photos in the council chamber without prior permission. Previously, journalists were not required to ask for approval from North Lincolnshire Council – and the Scunthorpe Telegraph was
A former regional press journalist who now teaches media law has put theory into practice after winning the right to overturn a section 39 order on a teenage murderer. David Crossland, a tutor on the post-graduate journalism courses at Trinity
A libel action launched against the Evening Chronicle in Newcastle, by the chairwoman and managing director of a care home company, has been settled. Mark McArdle, his mother Helen McArdle and Helen McArdle Care Ltd raised the action against the
The Express & Star has successfully overturned a naming ban on two children who broke into a zoo and battered two wallabies to death. The West Midlands newspaper persuaded district judge Michael Morris that it was in the public interest
Two schoolboys made the subject of an anti-social behaviour order have been named following the intervention of their local newspaper. The Newton and Golborne Guardian teamed up with a local housing trust to persuade magistrates that the pair, aged 11
The Craven Herald secured the lifting of reporting restrictions on a teenager who was handed Skipton’s first anti-social behaviour order. The boy is now no longer able to indulge in threatening behaviour anywhere in the town – unless he wants
Wakefield Express court reporter Charlie Bullough has cut through the red tape surrounding bolt-on anti-social behaviour order cases to win the right to name a persistent young offender. The Section 49 order protecting 16-year-old Ashley Atkinson, who was made the
An identification ban on a 17-year-old, who was in court after a spree of violent and intimidating behaviour, was lifted at the request of the Evening Gazette on Teesside. The judge at Teesside Magistrates Court agreed that naming the youth
The South Wales Argus has again been hit by a “back door” bid to ban the identification of adult defendants accused of offences against children. For the third time in recent months a Gwent council has sought – and been
The Press and Journal and Edinburgh Evening News are facing legal action after publishing the name of a 15-year-old charged with the murder of teenager Jodi Jones. The papers are being investigated for naming someone under the age of 16
Scarborough Evening News reporter Richard Harris has successfully argued that a court order should not be imposed in a case involving cruelty to a baby. It was his second successful legal identification challenge in a few months. In a letter
Journalists are being invited to attend a seminar to learn more about how the Data Protection Act relates to their job. Hosted by Rowe Cohen solicitors, the Vital Topics seminar will aim to equip journalists with accurate and relevant legal