Seven loses appeal over child’s “divorce” case

The Seven Network and Herald and Weekly Times have been ordered to pay $50,000 each to charity after losing appeals against a conviction for naming a boy who divorced his parents.

A report published in the Sunday Herald Sun newspaper in 2004 named the boy and included photographs of the child and his mother. His name was repeated on Melbourne’s Seven News, Sunrise and Today Tonight.

In 2006 Melbourne Magistrate Lisa Hannan found the report breached the Children and Young Persons Act 1989 for publishing or causing to be published a report likely to lead to the identification of a party in a Children’s Court proceeding. Ms Hannan ordered Seven pay $50,000 to The Smith Family and the Herald and Weekly Times the same amount to the charity Kids Under Cover.

Former Sunday Herald Sun editor Alan Howe, Seven Melbourne news director Stephen Carey and Today Tonight national executive producer Craig McPherson were individually found guilty of contempt of court and fined. Howe was ordered to pay $3000 to the Royal Children’s Hospital, Carey to pay $2000 to the Make a Wish Foundation and McPherson to pay $2000 to the Salvation Army.

Both companies had convictions recorded against them and were placed on two-year good behaviour bonds.

Last year, the media organisations appealed the convictions and fines before Supreme Court Justice Katharine Williams, who dismissed their appeal. A further appeal began before the full bench of the Court of Appeal in April.

Both organisations argued the reports, which did not specifically mention court proceedings, did not convey to the reader or viewer that a children’s court proceeding had taken place. They argued that a breach of the Act required a “narrative, description, retelling or recital” of a Children’s Court proceeding.

But Court of Appeal Justices found the stories breached the Children’s and Young Persons Act. “We consider that the publications purported to recite something that has happened in the proceedings, or something about the proceedings,” the Justices wrote. “They did so by describing the outcome of proceedings which had actually occurred in the Children’s Court and explaining that the divorce was granted on the grounds of irreconcilable differences.”

The organisations and journalists were ordered to pay the fines handed down in the Magistrates’ Court.

Appeals by the Director of Public Prosecutions against the non-convictions of Sunrise presenter David Koch, Sunrise executive producer Adam Boland and Sunday Herald Sun journalist Chris Tinkler were dismissed.

Source: Herald Sun / AAP