Brickbat: Watch What You Print

In the United Kingdom, the Society of Editors, which represents newspaper and magazine editors, has criticized Attorney General Victoria Prentis for warning media outlets that their coverage of sexual misconduct claims against actor Russell Brand could amount to contempt of court. Under British law, it is illegal to publish material that could affect a criminal trial once a suspect has been arrested or a warrant has been issued. But Brand has not been charged with any crimes. "At the moment there are no active proceedings when there have been no arrests – so it is a very unusual warning," said Dawn Alford, executive director of the Society of Editors. "I'd say it is worrying and also unnecessary."

Comments

[Jerryskids]

I'm pretty sure criticizing the Attorney General is also contempt of court. Those people just don't learn, do they?

[Rossami]

They have forgotten that 1984 was a dystopian warning, not a playbook.

[Adans smith]

Do the Brits really have laws or just make it up as they go?

[Mickey Rat]

The people in Britain are “subjects”. The primary restraint o the powers of the government are theoretically , the voters, who have no real choices, just slightly different brands of technocrat. Rather like the difference between Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola. Which means there is no practical restraint.

[Will Nonya]

They have more in common with the US than I thought..

[Fist of Etiquette]

I thought "believe all women" had been codified into supreme universal law, or am I thinking of "trans women are women"?

[Idaho Bob]

Women are women unless they attend tech conferences. Then they are cis men.

[tracerv]

Let's ask Trevor Bauer.

[Mickey Rat]

“Your Honor,

Your warning is misplaced as there are currently no charges against Mr. Brand, therefore it is offensive to the principles of a free press. In other words, bugger off and know your place.”

[Longtobefree]

She knows her place; there is no free press in GB.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DSMA-Notice

[Davedave]

What a load of nonsense. There are ongoing police investigations. The same laws exist in the US, and for good reason: prejudicing trials harms justice.

[Mickey Rat]

So if the police investigate a journalist then no journalists are allowed to discuss what is bring investigated, and the journalist himself is not allowed to discuss how he is being treated, or make a living?

There is a good deal of similarity in the facts to what is happening to Brand and what happened to Assange, in that there iscacpredicate in the accusations of sexial impropriety as a justification to silence him.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Yup, that free speech stuff is nonsense. But you hate liberty and love the state, so it makes sense to you.

[Zeb]

So then all a government needs to do to silence people on a particular topic is to start an investigation? Sounds legit.

[Rossami]

On the contrary, there are not laws allowing prior restraint of speech or press even about on-going investigations.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

DON'T TALK ABOUT DONALD TRUMP!

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

Publicly released warrants or double secret star chamber warrants?

[Dillinger]

wait, the Press is supposed to disagree with the AG?

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[mamabug]

I doubt the warning is due to Brand being shielded by the establishment, he is enough outside of it that he's able to be freely targeted. I suspect the AG is planning or has started investigations and may just be confused as to the law.

Whether it is a good law or not is a different topic.