The law is an extremely important aspect of society for any Journalist to learn. It has a relevance in all that journalists do because reporting on it is the backbone of our work. It is also extremely important because there are restrictions on us as Journalist sand it is important to know these, you don't really want to be done for contempt of court do you? Well obviously the answer is no, the fine for it can be up to £30,000 or 6 months in Jail. With that in mind, here are my Law notes with some top tips to avoid being done, (now all you need to do is avoid being caught and you're set).
There are three basic legal principles we have to observe as Journalists with the first and in sometime most important being The Presumption of Innocence. Everyone who is being accused of a crime by the police, defended in a court and tried by a jury has to be thought of as innocent until it is proven beyond reasonable doubt that they are guilty. Just because someone has been charged does not make them guilty. This leads on to the concept of prejudice. It is used in law in a similar way to the rest of the world, i.e. that before you have gained any evidence to the contrary, you have pre-judged the person and you have your own preconceived ideas about them. This takes us to contempt of court for which there is no defence. If you in any way shape or form are seen to have prejudiced the jury in some way you WILL be done for contempt of court; it's a strict liability offence and will cause a mistrial. The court is one of the few places where you can't be done for Libel though which will be fully explained in later lectures on the subject of Libel. If you are caught out for libel however, you can occasionally use your 'Qualified Privilege' as a Journalist to grant you exemption from a law in certain cases. These cases are often where the Journalist believes the information they are giving is in the public interest so it is in the public interest to practically destroy someone in the public trust who is lying and doing bad things. If however you are just attacking someone from your privileged position as a Journalist then you lose your qualified privilege because of your own malice. The opposite is the working in the public interest, the public interest is the rock on which we as Journalists stand on.
The second principle is that Justice must be seen to be done. This is where the innocence project that we will tackle in our third year becomes particularly interesting because, using Chris Horrie's example of The Birmingham Six, there is nothing like getting innocent people freed when they have been convicted wrongly. As a journalist you have all these legal rights in the court because you are the eyes and ears of the public. If the Judges had it all their own way, everyone in the country would be at every single trial. Since this isn't practical we have to report the occurrences in the court to make sure justice is done. Finally, the law must be based on evidence, or more specifically admissible evidence. Introducing evidence that is not strictly related to the case or the charge is actually contempt of court. If someone is being charged for a murder, bringing up a bunch of previous theft charges is a serious contempt of court as it would prejudice the jury.
There are two types of court, the criminal court and the civil court. The civil court tends to deal mainly with divorce and libel and so it is not as newsworthy as the criminal court, (except for maybe Celebrity Divorce). As Journalists we tend to stick to the criminal court, again because it is more in the public interest. Barristers are normally found in the Crown court (criminal) with, in the most intelligent way, short wigs. It's the best way to describe them. They have to prove their case beyond reasonable doubt using witnesses. I'm finding it interesting as well even having only been on the course for such a short time that the lectures cross over quite a lot. Proving the case beyond reasonable doubt for example is a form of Descartes Cartesian doubt from the History and Context of Journalism lecture. The idea that you cannot believe a certain thing until you have rationalised it and proved it beyond reasonable doubt is one that resonates across the board to Journalists. There are of course two teams of barristers in the court, prosecution and defence, and for the first day in crown court (cases can go on a year if necessary) it is purely prosecution, the evidence in chief.
It would be wrong to call the Magistrates court a collection on old Tory women who were in some ways busybodies if it wasn't also so right. They have to volunteer for their position and so do not have the same power as a qualified Judge, and with good reason. The most Magistrates can dish out is a £5000 fine or a 6 month jail sentence which is quite enough really. They can also send things to a higher court if necessary because in fairness, all cases have to begin at the Magistrates court, no matter how bad the crime. Indictable crime though, (the kind that gives a sentence of 5 years or longer) cannot be dealt with fully in a Magistrates court using summary justice.
Thanks for reading my Law notes from the second lecture. Hope they were as helpful to you as they are to me.
I'll be updating my blog from now on when I hear of a case that I can apply my new knowledge of the law of Journalists to so look out for new posts as often as I can write them.
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