S.11 Contempt of Court Act
Littlewood
The Defendant was charged with serious sexual offences against young boys and child cruelty. The charges related to the time when he worked as Deputy Manager and Manager at three children’s homes in Scunthorpe and Grimsby. Two other defendant faced similar charges arising out of their employment at the homes, but were to be tried separately.
An order was made under S.11 preventing the identification of all three defendants and the names of the children’s homes – the police investigation was continuing. One of the defendants (Mair) had had his property attacked.
However, Judge Peter Heppel QC after heard argument in which reference was made to Article 6 of the Convention (right to a fair trial) stated:
“In my judgement, it cannot be the case that the more heinous the allegation the greater privacy should be afforded to the accused. I do not regard the grounds under which the S.11 order was made as appropriate … I have come to the conclusion there is not a substantial risk to the administration of justice in this case”.
The judge imposed a S.4(2) order preventing the identification of children’s homes until conclusion of all three trials.
Littlewood was subsequently convicted and sent to prison.
Anti-Hunt Campaigners (R v Keith Bailey and others)
The defendants were allegedly anti-hunt campaigners charged with conspiracy to commit violent disorder in connection with an attack on hunt kennels in Felbridge, Surrey.
Magistrates imposed a S.11 order preventing the defendants’ addresses from being read out in court or published “in the interests of justice”. The Magistrates had been given details of a history of intimidation and intemperate behaviour both from hunt protesters and from hunt supporters.
That order was subsequently upheld by the residing circuit judge who stated:
“I will allow the order to remain in place to protect the defendants and to avoid intimidation and exacerbation of the situation”.
Application was made to have the court to set aside the order. HH Judge Bassingthwaighte decided the order had been wrongly imposed. He found that there were no exceptional circumstances to warrant the order remaining in place. There was also no evidence that the administration of justice would be affected. The defendants did not face any threat of violence because the website on which their names had appeared had closed down and there had been no complaint arising out of that publication.
Judge Bassingthwaighte noted that emotions about fox hunting run high and accepted the argument put forward by the paper’s Counsel that emotional reactions to whether an address should be disclosed were irrelevant unless the Defendants could show that their publication would impede the course of justice. He acknowledged that the S.11 order was not designed for the defendants’ comfort. Where Defendants invite the court to infringe the principle of publication without restriction they should produce evidence relevant to their particular case, for example that there are grounds for a fear of future offences or harassment.
R v Michael Alan Blair
A S.11 order was made by which the Press were prevented from reporting the defendant’s name, address, details of the charges (possession of indecent photographs of pre-teenage girls) and any details of the proceedings. The reasons for the imposition of the order were that publicity would have an adverse effect on the small community in which he lives and could possibly cause rioting due to the current public feeling against paedophiles. Further, the defendant’s wife was suffering from some sort of mental illness, the defendant had two children who would be adversely affected by the publicity.
The order was to last until the conclusion of the case, but it appeared that the court was considering extending the order. However, after writing to the Court on behalf of The Citizen and the WDP, the Court accepted that they should not renew the S.11 Order.
