Mail: two libel payouts in two days

On 16 July, the Mail apologised to Marlon King for a false story it published about him, which it had copied from the Sun.

On 21 July, the Mail apologised to Cheryl Cole for a false story it published about her, which it had copied from the Sun.

Today, both the Mail and Sun have apologised and paid (around £80,000) libel damages to Parameswaran Subramanyam for false stories they published about him. This time, however, the Sun copied it from the Mail.

Subramanyam went on a 23-day hunger strike in Parliament Square in April 2009 during protests against the Sri Lankan government's offensive against the Tamil Tigers.

But on 9 October, the Mail ran a story headlined 'Hunger striker's £7m Big Mac' which claimed - on the basis of an anonymous police source - that Subramanyam had been secretly eating hamburgers and wasn't actually on hunger strike at all. The following day, the Sun ran the same story, with the headline 'Hunger Striker was Lovin’ It: Bogus…striker was 'eating burgers''.

Unsurprisingly, the story quickly spread around anti-Tamil websites.

But today:

Victoria Jolliffe, counsel for Associated Newspapers and News Group newspapers, told the court that both organisations had withdrawn the allegations and apologised 'sincerely and unreservedly' to Subramanyam for the distress that had been caused.

The Mail ran this, linked from their homepage, although positioned very near the bottom:

An article (9 October 2009), 'Hunger striker's £7m Big Mac', reported claims that Mr Subramanyam was caught secretly eating burgers while on hunger strike during the Tamil protest in London, wasting significant police costs. We now accept that there was no truth in these allegations and we and other media have agreed to pay him damages and have apologised to Mr Subramanyam for the distress and embarrassment caused.

The Sun published this:

Our article of 9 October 2009 falsely alleged that throughout a 23 day hunger strike, Mr Parameswaran Subramanyam secretly ate takeaway burgers when dishonestly claiming he was on hunger strike in support of Sri Lankan Tamils, in a campaign which was policed at considerable expense and caused the police to waste public money.

We now accept that these allegations are totally untrue. Mr Subramanyam, whose sole aim has always been to promote the Tamil cause, did not eat any food at all during his hunger strike.

We apologise to Mr Subramanyam and his family for any upset and embarrassment caused and are paying him a substantial sum in damages.

Subramanyam's lawyer, Magnus Boyd, said:

“The allegations are entirely false which both defendants now accept. The claimant did not consume any food at all throughout his hunger strike. The Metropolitan Police Superintendent who was in charge of the operation in Parliament Square confirmed that there was no police surveillance team using 'specialist monitoring equipment' and that no video evidence existed.”

Subramanyam added:

"I am relieved that this matter is now resolved and I can start to rebuild my life again The past eight months have been an unbearable strain on my life, to the extent that at times I have even contemplated taking my own life.

"As a result of the lies that the Newspapers published about me, and through no fault of my own, I have lost friends, been shunned by family members and completely ostracised from the Tamil community."

For the Mail, it's two humiliations in two days.

Because yesterday, Associated Newspapers paid undisclosed libel damages to Reza Pankhurst over false claims he had groomed a suicide bomber. The Mail published an apology for this on 21 April. Inexplicably, it took the Evening Standard, which made the same claims, until 13 May to do the same.

Pankhurst's lawyer Lucy Moorman told the court:

the allegations in the articles were false and that both papers had now agreed to pay him costs and damages for the “injury to his reputation and the distress caused to him” by the articles.

(In other Mail libel news, Nathaniel Rothschild has today launched a libel action against the paper over a front-page story from 22 May.)

(Hat-tip to exclarotive)

14-year-old does 'bikini photo shoot'...

...and the Daily Mail calls the pictures 'stunning':

Mail thinks one third more is the same as three times more

Recent research from the University of Cambridge revealed babies born at night were very slightly more at risk of death than babies born during the day (9am-5pm).

As NHS Behind the Headlines says:

However, these results must be interpreted in the correct context, as the risk of newborn death was very low in both groups: 4.2 out of 10,000 births in normal working hours, and 5.6 out of 10,000 births out-of-hours.

That is one third more. It is not:


'Three times more' would be 12.6 out of 10,000 - a vast difference to 5.6.

Journalist Sophie Borland gets this right in her article, but the headline writer couldn't tell the difference - either because they didn't understand it's not the same, or because 'three times more likely' sounded more sensationalist.

However, Borland doesn't get everything totally correct. Her first sentence says:

Women who give birth at night or weekends face a higher risk of their baby dying due to hospital staffing shortages, research suggests.

However, as Behind the Headlines points out:

It is misleading to report that the associations may be ‘due to hospital staffing shortages’, as the causes of different death rates have not been examined in this research and any such claims are based on speculation.

(Hat-tip to Alex P)

'All the garbage that is coming into your country'

The Daily Mail reports that two Chilean Rose tarantulas have been found in Bolton, and a vulture and a corn snake have been spotted in Devon.

One person leaving a comment decides this is the perfect story for an anti-immigration rant.

And this comment was approved in advance by the moderators:


(Hat-tip to Guy Kelly)

Mail apologises after copying untrue story from the Sun (part two)

On 16 July, the Sun apologised for a 4 March article about Cheryl Cole.

On 21 July, the Daily Mail apologised for a 5 March article about Cheryl Cole, which was based on the false one written in the Sun:

An article on March 5 followed up a Sun report that Cheryl Cole was preparing to fly to France to enter into talks with her estranged husband Ashley following a series of text messages.

We would like to make clear that she did not fly to France and that there were no texts.

An article on March 3, 'Is Cheryl about to take Ashley back?', reported that Cheryl Cole had agreed to attend counselling sessions following a series of phone calls and texts.

We accept that this was inaccurate and that she did not make the statements attributed to her.

We apologise to Ms Cole for the misunderstanding and are happy to set the record straight.

It's not explicitly saying, as the Star did, 'we made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story' but it does appear to be saying 'we made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story, we just copied what we read in the Sun.'

As they did with the Marlon King article they apologised for on 16 July.

The Mail and upskirts

Today, the Daily Mail was tut-tutting at allegations Jon Venables had been involved in taking 'upskirt' pictures on his mobile phone:


Yet for most of today, one of the Mail's leading 'showbiz' stories has been this:


The Mail says in the Venables piece:

The case was dropped due to insufficient evidence, but officers found a folder called 'Up Skirts' on his computer - containing 1,200 images.

How many pictures are in the Mail's 'Up Skirts' folder?

'We made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story before publication'

It seems the lawyers at Rockstar Games did get in touch with the Daily Star over their obviously untrue story (by Jerry Lawton) about a 'Grand Theft Auto: Rothbury' video game, based on the case of Raoul Moat.

Here's the very swift, and unusually long, apology, published today:

ROCKSTAR GAMES - GRAND THEFT AUTO - AN APOLOGY

On 21 July we published an article claiming that the video games company Rockstar Games were planning to release a version of their popular Grand Theft Auto video games series titled “Grand Theft Auto Rothbury”.

We also published what we claimed would be the cover of this game, solicited comments from a family member impacted by the recent tragedy and criticised Rockstar Games for their alleged plans.

We made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story before publication and did not contact Rockstar Games prior to publishing the story. We also did not question why a best selling and critically acclaimed fictional games series would choose to base one of their most popular games on this horrifying real crime event.

It is now accepted that there were never any plans by Rockstar Games to publish such a game and that the story was false. We apologise for publishing the story using a mock-up of the game cover, our own comments on the matter and soliciting critical comments from a grieving family member.

We unreservedly apologise to Rockstar Games and we have undertaken not to repeat the claims again. We have also agreed to pay them a substantial amount in damages which they are donating to charity.

The admission that they 'made no attempt to check the accuracy of the story before publication' is a damning one.

But is anyone surprised?

(Hat-tip to the anonymous comment person here)

Spot the front page apology

On 21 April 2010, the Daily Star ran this front page.

It came just as UK airspace was reopening after the shutdown cause by the volcanic ash cloud.

But the 'terror' and 'dramatic pictures' as 'plane hits ash cloud' were, it was only revealed deep into the story, from a television documentary about an incident from 1982.

To pretend this was some dramatic new event was desperate scaremongering and deliberately dishonest.

It led to this edition of the paper being removed from newsagent shelves at Gatwick and Manchester airports, on the grounds it was 'inappropriate'.

And several people complained to the Press Complaints Commission.

Originally, the Star offered to publish this clarification:

On April 21 2010, on our front page, we published a photograph about a British Airways jumbo jet flying into a cloud of volcanic ash. Our story which followed on page 6 made it clear that the image was part of a dramatic reconstruction of a near disaster when BA flight 009 flew into volcanic dust in 1982, due to be shown that night on Five, and not an image of any event that had taken place in the preceding days following the eruption of the volcano in Iceland.

However, this was deemed unacceptable by the complainants - and rightly so - and so on 17 July, the Star published this instead:

Our article of April 21 2010 headlined “Terror as plane hits ash cloud” – published on the day all UK airports opened their airspace following the volcanic ash disruption – featured a photograph said to show the “moment a British Airways jumbo jet hit a cloud of volcanic ash at 37,000ft”.

This may have wrongly suggested to readers that the photograph depicted a recent event.

As the story subsequently indicated, the image was part of a reconstruction of a near disaster when BA flight 009 flew into volcanic dust in 1982, due to be shown that night on Five.

We apologise to readers for any misunderstanding which may have been caused by the use of the image.

This clearly goes further than the Star initially wanted to go, but the 'apology to readers' is good. And the Star did actually give it a fairly prominent position on page two:


It's certainly an improvement on the very small page two apology mentioned here, although the nature of the story means it is easier to reprint the original.

But is it good enough given the original was the front page lead? Not really.

The Star seemed to recognise this, and so, for once, mentioned the apology on the front page as well:


Did you see it? Probably not because, as Media Monkey points out, it is in the:

bottom left...in what must surely be the tiniest font ever used in a print publication.

See:


So the size of the page two apology is fine. Although the Star should have been more upfront in their initial wording of the clarification, the final apology is reasonable.

And a mention of that apology on the front page is progress of a sort.

But when people ask that front page mistakes are clarified by front page apologies, this feeble effort isn't what they have in mind.

Churnalism: that's the way to do it

In Richard Littlejohn's latest book, which was serialised in the Mail in March, he says in his rant about political correctness:

Already some seaside councils have scrapped donkey rides on the grounds of animal cruelty and Punch and Judy because it glorifies domestic violence.

Neither claim was accurate and as the Punch and Judy website says:

the myth that Mr. Punch had been 'banned' by the authorities for not being politically correct duly entered contemporary folklore.

Yet a new version of this tale has emerged in both the Mail:


and Telegraph:


'PC officials'. 'Warnings'. 'Ordered'. Really?

The Mail says:

officials at a coastal resort have deemed a traditional Punch and Judy show too shocking for modern tastes, and ordered any violence to be removed from the script.

But who are the 'officials'? What 'warnings' did they give? Who 'ordered' the changes?

It's not very surprising to find that neither the Mail or Telegraph answer any of those questions - because those officials don't actually exist. It's just the usual lashing out at a generic 'PC brigade'.

Will people watching the show spot that 'any violence' has been 'removed from the script'? Probably not, as the Mail's article makes clear when it quotes the puppeteer:

"Mr Punch is still a rascal and still has a variety of weapons in his arsenal but they are more socially appropriate."

He also reveals Punch's usual stick has been replaced by a mop. Do these newspapers have nothing more important to write about than that?

Puppeteer Daniel Liversidge, who entertains kids under the name Mr Marvel, advertises his services like this:

Punch and Judy
Traditional and modern at the same time, the Punch and Judy show takes the original story of the timeless old rascal, Mr Punch, and brings him bang up to date in a politically correct 21st Century! The show includes the ever-present Judy, the long suffering baby and a surprise appearance from a very snappy crocodile, all kept under control by PC Plod, the policeman.

Therefore, it appears this 'up to date' version is, in fact, Liversidge's usual act. Thus the claim he's been 'ordered' to change it by 'officials' in Portsmouth looks even more hollow.

Indeed, in the Belfast Telegraph:

Nick Fletcher, spokesman for the venue, said the tower's management had not called for the changes to the show but said such alterations were inevitable...

"We have put no restraints on him but he has taken on board constructive comments from elsewhere and decided to make his Punch and Judy show more modern."

So how did the Mail and Telegraph write almost exactly the same story, with exactly the same slant and exactly the same quotes?

Step forward Blue Zebra PR. On Wednesday, they sent out a press release with the title 'Punch and Judy politics affect portsmouth performance: Puppet show toned down to meet PC standards' knowing that would get them - and their clients - some column inches from the usual suspects. The accuracy of it is, to them, secondary.

And the churnalism duly followed. For example, look at this paragraph from the Telegraph, repeating Littlejohn's lie about Colchester Borough Council:

However the three-hundred -year old show is increasingly falling victim to political correctness. Wiltshire council once discussed taking Punch and Judy books off their library shelves while Colchester council even planned to ban the puppet shows altogether.

And then this, from the original press release:

After Wiltshire County Council considered taking Punch and Judy books off its library shelves, and Colchester Borough Council threatened to ban the puppet shows, professors of the puppetry performance have felt under pressure to improve its reputation and bring a good name back to the nostalgic show.

All the quotes from Liversidge, and the event's commercial manager Paul Mahy, and all the bits in between, have been copied-and-pasted by the Mail and Telegraph straight from the press release.

Just to check the story, I emailed the Blue Zebra PR contact and asked for clarification on who the officials were. I got a reply, but didn't get an answer. But I was told:

Sadly we are unable to approve journalist’s stories before they go out, however we still think that the coverage for our client...is great!

Which says it all.

For comparison, screenshots of the press release and the two articles follow (click to enlarge):

Mock Star Game

Another day, another tabloid reporting on some fictional 'fury'.

This time it was the Daily Star and a claim that a video game based on Raoul Moat was being planned, called 'Grand Theft Auto: Rothbury'.


Having seen the mocked-up cover somewhere, the Star seems to have believed it was actually going to be made.

The Star even appears to have a quote from the sister of Moat's ex-girlfriend, who says the game is 'beyond belief'.

Of course it is. So how did 'journalist' Jerry Lawton and the people at the Star even begin to think this was real?

By this afternoon, the Star had hastily removed the story but the folk at MCV had taken this screenshot of it.

Tim Ingham from CVG wonders if the removal of the article was because they realised (finally) it was nonsense, or whether Grand Theft Auto publisher Rockstar Games had had a word.

The 'death knock'

Freelance journalist and trainer Chris Wheal has written a moving article on his blog about the behaviour of the media following the death of his nine-year-old nephew.

An experienced journalist, Chris said the experience was an 'eye-opener'.

He says that while the nationals were 'lazy' and just relied on churnalism, most of the local media was 'good'. However, there was one exception:

After getting my statement issued though the police and having seen rival papers out-scoop and take a more news-focused attitude...the News in Portsmouth sent a reporter to doorstep my sister. He was met with a torrent of abuse...

This was on Sunday. I tried to contact the News, with no luck. I called the police media officer, who called the crime reporter, who said it was unlikely to have been the News behaving like that. Later that night I did get confirmation from the News that it was them – and an apology.

Chris also highlights the vultures offering the family cash for 'their story':

Someone claiming to be from Love It magazine had phoned to offer cash...

Agency SWNS also called my sister yesterday offering money for the story – there is just no way they would accept money and you have to admit it is sick of the agency to even offer.

He ends:

My sister is not me. She is an inherently private person, as is her husband. They have never courted publicity. They have never sought to be in the press. They are not celebrities. I ask the press of consider that and leave them alone.

Sorry we said you idolised Abu Hamza, and other apologies

Back on 13 April, this blog highlighted the Sun's claim that footballer Marlon King had converted to Islam in prison and was idolising tabloid hate-figure Abu Hamza. The second bit, in particular, sounded very suspicious. Nonetheless, the Mail mindlessly churned out its own version of the Sun's story.

The Sun removed the story within a day. And now the Mail has written:

An article on 12 April referred to reports which suggested Marlon King had converted to Islam in prison, his hero was hate preacher Abu Hamza and cocaine had been found in his cell.

In fact, these reports were untrue and we apologise for any contrary impression that may have been given.

Firstly, it appears from a search of the Sun's website that they haven't apologised yet.

Secondly, it also appears to be another good example of the lies newspapers try to get away when the subject is in prison - there have been recent examples about Peter Sutcliffe and Boy George.

Finally, it's well known that newspapers use weasel words in apologies and clarifications, but 'contrary impression'? Really?

Given that all the Mail had done is 'suggest' all this was true under the headline:

Marlon King: Shamed Wigan star converts to Islam and names himself after hero Abu Hamza

it's hard to imagine how people got that 'contrary impression', isn't it?

And that's not the only football-related 'contrary impression' the Mail newspapers have been apologising for recently, this one from the Mail on Sunday:

Our story of February 21 ‘Chelsea helped Cole to silence claims of affair’, may have suggested that Chelsea FC and Steve Atkins, Head of Communications, encouraged a woman to lie by denying, falsely, that she had slept with a player.

In fact, there was no encouragement to lie and any advice was given to the woman in good faith on the understanding that the allegations were untrue. We apologise to Mr Atkins and Chelsea for any contrary impression given.

The Sun has also been issuing apologies about coverage of Ashley Cole's private life - this one to wife Cheryl:

As part of our coverage of the break-up of Cheryl and Ashley Cole's marriage we reported on March 4 that the singer would fly to France to meet her estranged husband who was texting her lines from her songs.

We accept Cheryl did not fly to France, no such texts were sent and she denies saying she was scared of life as a single girl as we reported on March 1. We are happy to set the record straight and apologise to Cheryl.

And back to the Mail for one more apology, this one to Vanessa Perroncel:

On January 31, we published some personal information about Vanessa Perroncel concerning an alleged affair with the footballer John Terry. We have since been informed she would have preferred this to remain private and it was untrue in any case. We apologise to Miss Perroncel for any distress caused.

Recommended reading - 5CC on Muslim bus drivers 'banning' guide dogs

Yesterday, the Mail ran the headline 'Muslim bus drivers refuse to let guide dogs on board'.

The article that followed was notable for providing no hard evidence at all that that headline was accurate.

Five Chinese Crackers has taken apart the Mail's article and followed it up with a look at the Star's coverage of the same story.

Recommended reading - 'Muslim-only' toilets

This Daily Star front page headline from last week was inspired by the Daily Mail story that was inspired by a Manchester Evening News story from the previous day.

So it is with modern-day tabloid 'journalism'.

New blog exclarotive has looked into the Star's coverage and found the front page splash falls down in two key respects: they aren't 'Muslim-only' toilets and the council didn't spend any money on them.

He has fired off a letter to the PCC about the Star's misleading headline and he's promised to keep us updated as to what happens next.

Express story goes down the drain

When the media writes myths about the EU, they either claim that something innocuous is being banned (milk jugs, a dozen eggs) or that there's some devilish, intrusive plan to force the EU's will on us (European income tax, Sharia law).

An eye-catching headline in the Express on 8 July fell into the latter category:

EU’s plan to liquify corpses and pour them down the drain.

The following day, the paper printed a letter from Ann Masters, one of the Express' regular correspondents, who reacted exactly as they hoped:

I felt sick to my stomach when reading the article "EU's plan to liquefy corpses and pour them down the drain" (July 8).

If this abhorrent act is to become law under EU ruling I hope David Cameron will be strong enough to say this would never be allowed in our country.

The thought of a loved one's body being poured down the drain fills me with horror. Having my mother cremated when I was just 15 was bad enough and very hard to bear but this is too repugnant to contemplate.

Where would be the dignity in such an awful way of saying goodbye to someone you love? This of course is all about reducing the amount of carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere.

It really does beggar belief.

Ann Masters, Barton-on-Sea, Hants

Indeed it does.

Because when the Express said 'EU's plan' what they actually meant was 'Belgium's Flemish Association of Undertakers' plan'. It's easy to confuse the two.

The EU Representative to the UK pointed out:

Whatever Belgian undertakers decide regarding funeral arrangements is a matter for the Belgian authorities. Just like it’s a matter for the UK authorities in this country.

The EU has no competence in this matter and to suggest otherwise is wide of the mark.

The Express has since removed the article from its website.