Trial by media and the price of public accusation

Trial by media describes a process in which publicity about alleged wrongdoing becomes a form of public adjudication, with consequences for reputation, relationships and livelihood that may precede, exceed or occur entirely outside legal proceedings. Its significance lies less in whether journalists expressly pronounce someone guilty than in whether the combined effect of reporting, institutional decisions and public reaction treats an unresolved allegation as a settled basis for exclusion.

The problem is particularly visible in entertainment and publishing, where a person’s public identity is also a commercial asset. A broadcaster may withdraw a presenter, a publisher may decline further books, and business partners may distance themselves before an allegation has been tested in court. Where the alleged conduct is not criminal, there may never be a prosecution through which the individual can obtain the public vindication commonly imagined as a “day in court”.

Public accountability operates through criminal law, professional standards and investigative journalism. Employers have responsibilities towards colleagues, and conduct may warrant professional consequences even where it falls outside criminal law. Each decision calls for an assessment of the evidence, the standards being applied and the fairness of the process.

Focusing on England and Wales, this essay argues that the central difficulty is the relationship between the evidence supporting an allegation and the speed, severity and duration of the consequences imposed. Court judgments, parliamentary evidence, workplace investigations and psychological research reveal different aspects of that relationship. Together, they support an approach to public accountability in which the quality of the evidence and the fairness of the process are proportionate to the seriousness of the consequences.

What trial by media means

“Trial by media” encompasses public judgments about criminal allegations and wider controversies concerning professional conduct. Greer and McLaughlin’s study of the media treatment of Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Ian Blair examines how sustained news narratives can challenge institutional authority and make a public position increasingly difficult to maintain. Their analysis locates the influence of the press within a wider interaction of political conflict and institutional relationships (Greer and McLaughlin, 2011).

This broader approach is useful because professional damage usually involves several decision-makers. Journalists choose what to investigate and publish; organisations assess employment, safeguarding or commercial risks; audiences decide whom to trust or support. Each actor bears responsibility for its own decisions, while operating in circumstances shaped by the actions of the others. Reporting can influence commercial assessments, and organisational responses can themselves become further news.

Entman’s account of framing helps explain the process. Selection and emphasis can promote particular definitions of a problem, explanations of its causes, moral evaluations and proposed responses (Entman, 1993). Applied to allegations against public figures, this suggests that a report’s overall presentation matters alongside its individual factual qualifications. Repeated images of disgrace, headlines anticipating professional collapse and commentary treating associates’ withdrawal as confirmation may encourage conclusions stronger than the evidence supports.

There is a particular risk of circular reasoning. An organisation may distance itself because controversy is commercially uncomfortable, without reaching a conclusion about the underlying facts. If that withdrawal is then presented as evidence that the allegations must be well founded, a response to publicity becomes apparent corroboration of the story that generated it. Responsible analysis should therefore ask separately what an organisation decided, why it decided it and what, if anything, its decision establishes about the alleged conduct.

Trial by media cases and their different lessons

Christopher Jefferies and the damage caused by suspicion

The treatment of Christopher Jefferies following his arrest during the investigation into Joanna Yeates’s murder demonstrates the danger of converting suspicion into a public character judgment. He was never charged. The subsequent contempt proceedings against the publishers of the Daily Mirror and The Sun concerned reporting capable of seriously impeding the investigation and any ensuing proceedings.

In HM Attorney-General v MGN Ltd and News Group Newspapers Ltd [2011] EWHC 2074 (Admin), the court expressly recognised Jefferies’s factual innocence. Its reasoning also extended beyond the familiar concern that publicity might influence a jury. Vilification could discourage people with helpful evidence from coming forward or cause them to doubt the significance of what they knew: the publicity could damage the process through which reliable evidence was obtained ([3], [31], [35]–[37]).

Jefferies’s experience exposes a weakness in the suggestion that more publicity necessarily produces more truth. Public scrutiny can uncover evidence, but accusatory reporting can also discourage contradiction. The issue is not confined to celebrities with valuable commercial contracts; an individual drawn into a news story may acquire a damaging public identity without having sought public prominence.

Cliff Richard and the loss of a publishing opportunity

Richard v British Broadcasting Corporation [2018] EWHC 1837 (Ch) provides unusually concrete evidence of commercial harm. The BBC extensively broadcast the police search of Sir Cliff Richard’s home in August 2014. The investigation ended without charges in June 2016, and his subsequent privacy claim against the broadcaster succeeded.

The judgment records plans for an updated autobiography linked to his seventy-fifth birthday tour. A substantial advance had been agreed, although no contract had been signed. Richard and his adviser postponed the project during the investigation, despite continuing publisher interest. By the time it ended, the commercial opportunity had passed and both sides had lost interest. Mann J accepted causation in fact and law in relation to the lost opportunity ([400]–[408], [430]).

The lost publishing opportunity demonstrates how publicity can interrupt a person’s ability to work and exhaust a time-sensitive commercial opening. Subsequent vindication cannot recreate the commercial moment that has passed, even where financial compensation is available.

Paul Gambaccini and the cost of remaining under investigation

The House of Commons Home Affairs Committee’s Police bail report records that Paul Gambaccini was arrested in October 2013, repeatedly re-bailed and eventually informed in October 2014 that no further action would be taken. Once his identity became public, the BBC suspended him without pay. The committee recorded approximately £200,000 in combined lost income and legal fees (Home Affairs Committee, 2015, [12], [28]).

The interaction between publicity, organisational decisions and investigative delay is important. An initially precautionary suspension can become a substantial deprivation of income when the underlying process continues for months. Its practical severity depends on its duration as well as the stated reason for imposing it. An institution that describes a measure as temporary should therefore remain responsible for reviewing whether its continuation is justified.

MasterChef and the distinction between investigation and public accusation

The MasterChef controversies require a different analysis. In July 2025, Banijay UK reported that a seven-month investigation by Lewis Silkin had considered 83 allegations against Gregg Wallace from 41 complainants, interviewed 78 witnesses and substantiated 45 allegations. Most substantiated allegations concerned inappropriate sexual language and humour. Banijay concluded that his return to the programme was untenable (Banijay UK, 2025).

Wallace apologised for distress caused while disputing the portrayal of his conduct and complaining of trial by media. He maintained that the serious allegations against him had not been upheld (ITV News, 2025a).

The decision to end Wallace’s role can be examined against the findings of the workplace investigation. The central questions are whether its procedures were fair, how it assessed the complaints and whether the consequences were proportionate to the conduct it substantiated.

John Torode’s departure illustrates another distinction. In July 2025, the BBC and Banijay said his contract would not be renewed after an allegation of racist language was upheld within the investigation. Torode denied the allegation and said he had no recollection of the incident. He also challenged the way he learned of his departure, while Banijay said the allegation had been formally discussed with him (ITV News, 2025b).

Torode’s case brings the contractual form and extent of the professional consequences into focus. The decision concerned renewal of a particular presenting role, while other work continued: the publisher’s listing for John & Lisa’s Weeknight Dinners records publication in September 2026 (Penguin, 2026). The combination illustrates how the loss of a prominent position can coexist with continuing opportunities elsewhere.

David Walliams and commercial withdrawal

David Walliams’s publishing relationship supplies a further example. In December 2025, HarperCollins said that it would no longer publish new titles by him. Sky News reported the decision following allegations of inappropriate behaviour reported by the Telegraph. Walliams’s representative strongly denied inappropriate behaviour and said that he had neither been informed of allegations by HarperCollins nor been given an opportunity to answer questions in an investigation (Sky News, 2025). In September 2026, The Bookseller reported that HarperCollins had also dropped his backlist (Snow, 2026).

The example raises an important question about commercial power. Refusing future commissions and withdrawing an existing catalogue can have different consequences for an author’s livelihood and public standing. Whether a particular step is contractually permissible is one question; whether it is supported by a fair and proportionate assessment is another. A commercial decision should not acquire the authority of a finding of misconduct merely because the reasons or evidence behind it are not publicly available.

The cases reveal several routes from public accusation to professional loss, involving different decision-makers, evidential foundations and opportunities for redress. Their value lies in showing how those processes operate and where safeguards can make a practical difference.

What the law protects

The presumption of innocence and its limits

Article 6(2) of the European Convention on Human Rights protects the presumption of innocence. Its operation extends beyond a judge’s directions to a criminal jury. In Allen v United Kingdom [GC], application no 25424/09, the European Court of Human Rights explained both its procedural role and its protection against public authorities treating an acquitted person, or someone whose proceedings have been discontinued, as guilty. Its application to subsequent proceedings depends on an appropriate connection with the concluded criminal case ([93]–[94], [103]–[104]).

The presumption governs the determination and official treatment of criminal guilt. Journalism, workplace investigations and commercial decisions address different questions, with legal responsibilities appropriate to their respective functions.

The presumption also provides an ethical foundation for caution when serious consequences depend on disputed accusations. Its relevance outside criminal proceedings lies in the value of testing evidence and providing a fair opportunity to answer it. The safeguards appropriate to a particular decision should reflect both its purpose and its potential impact on the individual.

Contempt of court and the protection of legal proceedings

The Contempt of Court Act 1981 addresses the most literal form of trial by media. Under sections 1 and 2, publication can attract strict liability where it creates a substantial risk that active proceedings will be seriously impeded or prejudiced, irrespective of an intention to interfere. Schedule 1 identifies when proceedings become active; in criminal matters, this can occur upon arrest, before charge.

The protection is directed towards the administration of justice. It explains why the reporting about Jefferies could constitute contempt even though he was ultimately never tried. Sections 4 and 5 also protect specified forms of court reporting and discussion of public affairs, subject to their statutory conditions. These provisions accommodate public scrutiny while protecting the integrity of legal proceedings.

The focus on proceedings leaves professional harm arising from other controversies to be addressed through privacy, defamation, employment and contractual protections, where their respective requirements are met. Those protections become particularly important when a workplace allegation attracts extensive publicity but gives rise to no criminal case.

Privacy and the consequences of identification

The Supreme Court has expressly recognised the damage associated with identifying people under criminal investigation. In Bloomberg LP v ZXC [2022] UKSC 5, it confirmed a legitimate starting point that a person under criminal investigation has, before charge, a reasonable expectation of privacy concerning information about that investigation. This remains subject to the particular circumstances and the subsequent balancing of Article 8 privacy rights against Article 10 freedom of expression ([76]–[78]).

The Court also rejected excessive confidence in the public’s ability to apply the presumption of innocence. It recognised that publication ordinarily causes reputational and other harm, potentially “profound and irremediable” ([108]–[109]). The ruling concerned investigations by state law-enforcement bodies, with the position concerning journalists’ own investigations left open ([78]).

Open justice can produce a different outcome. In Khuja v Times Newspapers Ltd [2017] UKSC 49, the majority permitted reporting of information disclosed in a public criminal trial which identified a person who had not been charged. The Court recognised the risk that readers might infer guilt, but gave substantial weight to reporting public proceedings. It also acknowledged that a public interest in reporting proceedings does not invariably establish a sufficient public interest in identifying every individual involved ([8], [30], [34]).

These decisions reveal a tension within the law’s own account of publicity. Identification can damage private life, yet reporting what courts do enables scrutiny of the justice system. Their reconciliation requires a close assessment of the source and context of the information, the contribution made by identification and the consequences for those concerned.

Defamation and public interest journalism

Defamation law offers a route to challenge damaging publications. Section 1 of the Defamation Act 2013 requires serious reputational harm, and Lachaux v Independent Print Ltd [2019] UKSC 27 establishes that the threshold concerns actual or probable impact, not merely the inherent tendency of words to injure reputation. Serious harm can be established by appropriate inference from the evidence; it need not always be demonstrated through witnesses describing particular reactions ([12]–[16], [21]).

The Act also protects publication. Section 2 provides a defence of substantial truth. Section 4 separately protects statements on matters of public interest where the defendant reasonably believed publication was in the public interest. A successful public-interest defence is therefore not necessarily a judicial finding that every disputed allegation was true.

In Serafin v Malkiewicz [2020] UKSC 23, the Supreme Court explained the importance of applying section 4’s statutory requirements rather than a rigid checklist. Failure to invite pre-publication comment is relevant and may defeat the defence, but an invitation is not an inflexible legal requirement in every case ([74]–[77]).

Litigation offers a route to vindication for those with an actionable claim and the resources to pursue it. A person facing widespread professional rejection must identify a specific legal wrong, select the appropriate defendant and bear the practical burden of seeking redress. The breadth of the public consequences may therefore far exceed the scope of the dispute a court is able to resolve.

PPT and the limits of an injunction against publication

The relationship between serious harm and the availability of a remedy arose directly in PPT v Independent Television News Limited and another [2026] EWHC 2818 (KB). On 3 November 2026, Nicklin J dismissed an anonymised claimant’s claim for a final injunction preventing two media organisations from publishing allegations which he denied. The claim relied on Articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, with Article 8 advanced as an alternative. The court accepted that anticipated publication and publication itself would materially and very substantially increase the claimant’s suicide risk, describing that risk as “objectively verified, present and continuing” ([244]).

The Article 2 analysis turned on responsibility for protecting the claimant against that danger. The judgment located the state’s operational responsibility in the psychiatric hospital and mental-health services, which had assumed responsibility for his immediate safety and could provide substantial protection through treatment and clinical risk management. Establishing a corresponding judicial duty to restrain private publishers required a further legal foundation. Nicklin J concluded that the proposed extension of responsibility went beyond the established authorities ([245]–[258]).

The claim also encountered a distinct difficulty concerning the legal basis for an injunction. PPT had deliberately framed his case directly through Convention rights. The court required an established domestic legal or equitable foundation for restraining the publishers and found that the claim supplied neither an appropriate cause of action nor a sufficient basis for exceptional equitable intervention ([264]–[271]). The Article 8 claim encountered the same obstacle ([299]–[306]).

Nicklin J nevertheless examined the balance between Articles 8 and 10 as an alternative ground of decision. He gave very substantial weight to the anticipated harm to the claimant’s psychological integrity and family life. Against that stood the substantial public interest in the proposed journalism, the rights of sources to communicate their experiences and the breadth of an injunction that could suppress publication for an uncertain and potentially indefinite period. On that alternative analysis, the balance also favoured refusing the injunction ([307]–[330]).

For the study of trial by media, the case exposes the distance between judicial recognition of serious harm and entitlement to prevent publication. From the affected person’s perspective, treatment addresses the danger to health while publication may remain a source of profound distress. The court’s allocation of protective responsibility therefore gives particular importance to the safeguards operating within the publication process itself: how disputed material is presented, how the response is conveyed and how foreseeable harm is taken into account.

The competing arguments before judgment are examined in Suicide risk and the right to publish (LawTeacher, 2026a). The subsequent ruling and its human consequences are considered in PPT v ITN and the Guardian: suicide risk, press freedom and the consequences of publication (LawTeacher, 2026b).

When the alleged conduct is not criminal

Much of the difficulty surrounding trial by media arises because public debate treats criminal liability as the sole credible measure of wrongdoing. Employment and professional relationships necessarily apply other standards. Humiliating colleagues, persistent inappropriate remarks or an abuse of workplace authority can warrant intervention without producing a criminal prosecution.

The Acas Code of Practice on Disciplinary and Grievance Procedures emphasises investigation, notification of the concern, an opportunity to respond and an appeal. It also states that a criminal charge or conviction is not normally, by itself, a reason for disciplinary action: the implications for the person’s work and relationships must be considered. Where paid suspension is necessary, the Code envisages a brief period, kept under review, rather than treatment as a disciplinary sanction (Acas, 2015, [5]–[8], [9]–[12], [26]–[29], [31]).

The Code excludes non-renewal of fixed-term contracts on expiry. More generally, employment status and contractual terms determine the protections available to employees, freelance presenters and authors.

There is a strong case for extending basic procedural safeguards across professional relationships where adverse decisions can seriously affect a person’s livelihood. Organisations exercising that power should be able to explain the evidence and reasoning supporting their decisions, particularly when their actions are likely to be understood publicly as findings of wrongdoing.

Fairness must also extend to complainants. Banijay’s account of the Wallace investigation recorded that freelance staff sometimes feared raising concerns because doing so could affect future employment (Banijay UK, 2025). Professional vulnerability is therefore present on both sides of a complaint. Protecting a prominent individual from unjustified exclusion while leaving less powerful workers unable to report mistreatment would reproduce the same imbalance in another form.

Professional accountability depends on a process capable of examining workplace conduct, protecting those affected and reaching a reasoned decision about the relevant standards. The fairness and rigour of that process provide the basis for assessing the action taken.

Trial by social media

Social media changes the distribution of accusatory power. Professional news organisations retain considerable influence, but allegations can also be circulated, interpreted and acted upon by large numbers of people with no common editorial process. The consequences may extend from criticism to coordinated pressure on employers, threats and the disclosure of personal information.

Trottier’s concept of digital vigilantism describes collective attempts to impose consequences through unwanted and sustained visibility. The analytical value lies in identifying how publicity itself can become a means of punishment, rather than merely a way of communicating a complaint (Trottier, 2017). Ordinary criticism, lawful consumer choices and good-faith reporting should nevertheless be distinguished from harassment or organised intimidation.

The possibility of legal liability remains. In McAlpine v Bercow [2013] EWHC 1342 (QB), the court considered a tweet which asked why Lord McAlpine was trending and included the words “innocent face”. Read in context, it conveyed a defamatory allegation of guilt rather than an innocent request for information ([84]–[90]). A question or insinuation can carry a damaging meaning without setting out an explicit accusation.

The case also illustrates why evaluating a statement in isolation may be inadequate. Its significance can depend on information already circulating among its audience. A short post may connect separate fragments into an allegation that none of those fragments expressly states. Repeating material as speculation does not necessarily neutralise its meaning.

The accountability problem is consequently distributed. One publisher may correct an article while screenshots and derivative commentary remain in circulation. A broadcaster may explain that a suspension was precautionary while social-media discussion continues to describe it as proof. The task of repair involves identifying which propositions were inaccurate, who adopted them and how the relevant audience can be reached, rather than assuming that one correction resolves every consequence.

Whether reputations recover

The concern that accusations can outlast their correction has empirical support, although the evidence requires careful interpretation. Haesevoets, Reinders Folmer and Brebels (2025) conducted four experiments examining accusations, trust and organisational decisions. Refutation improved evaluations, but allegations concerning integrity could leave residual disadvantages. One study involved 111 UK participants with hiring experience making decisions in a simulated recruitment setting.

These findings suggest a mechanism through which discredited allegations can continue to influence professional decisions. The experiments examined hypothetical recruitment decisions, leaving the extent and duration of such effects in actual careers as questions for further research.

Research also identifies circumstances in which reputational recovery is possible. Greitemeyer and Sagioglou (2015), using experimental scenarios about alleged academic misconduct, found that exonerating information could restore evaluations to levels comparable with those in conditions without an accusation. Read together, the studies suggest that the effectiveness of correction depends on the allegation, its context and the information used to answer it.

The evidence therefore supports a practical obligation to take correction seriously. A useful correction must address the proposition people were encouraged to believe. Where an allegation has been demonstrated to be false, merely reporting that the person has denied it leaves the original evidential position substantially unchanged. Conversely, a decision not to prosecute should be reported accurately without automatically describing it as proof that a complainant lied.

Professional reconsideration is a related but separate task. Correcting the public record does not necessarily restore an expired contract or revive a lost publishing opportunity. An organisation may also have reasons for a decision that survive the correction. Fair reassessment requires identifying those reasons, rather than allowing an initial allegation to remain an unexamined obstacle after its factual basis has changed.

Public interest and proportionate procedural fairness

Investigative journalism has a public-interest role in bringing dispersed accounts together, revealing patterns unavailable to individual complainants and exposing organisations whose internal systems have failed. Allowing the institution under investigation to determine when scrutiny becomes permissible would risk protecting the very failures that reporting seeks to examine.

Public-interest reporting also depends on being able to publish before every disputed matter is judicially resolved. The legitimate interests of readers, colleagues and potential future complainants may require timely information. Legal proceedings may be unavailable, inappropriate or concerned with questions different from those raised by a workplace investigation.

PPT connects that freedom with responsibilities towards the person facing publication. Nicklin J stated: “The fact that the Claimant disputes the allegations remains important and must be reported fairly” ([319]). He also emphasised publishers’ responsibility to take account of the foreseeable harm that publication may cause ([321]). Applied to trial by media, those observations support careful editorial scrutiny of the impression created by a report as a whole, including its headlines, presentation of disputed evidence and treatment of the person’s response.

The issue is how that freedom is exercised and how other institutions respond to it. Procedural safeguards should be proportionate to the decision being made. The threshold for opening an investigation need not be the threshold for imposing an enduring professional exclusion. A precaution justified by an immediate risk may require reconsideration once that risk can be managed in a less damaging way.

Existing regulatory standards provide useful foundations. For participating publications, clause 1 of the Editors’ Code requires care over accuracy, distinguishes fact from comment and conjecture, and requires significant inaccuracies to be corrected promptly and with due prominence. It also provides for a fair opportunity to reply to significant inaccuracies when reasonably requested (IPSO, 2025).

Broadcasting standards contain a more directly relevant pre-publication safeguard. Ofcom’s fairness rules ordinarily require an appropriate and timely opportunity to respond where a programme alleges wrongdoing or incompetence or makes other significant allegations. Its guidance also addresses providing enough information to permit an informed response (Ofcom, n.d., rule 7.11). Together, these regulatory standards provide models of accuracy, response and correction for the publications and broadcasters within their scope.

Building on these existing protections, a broader framework of institutional fairness should develop four principles.

First, the status of the evidence should remain visible throughout reporting and institutional communication. A first-hand account, an independently corroborated allegation, a finding in a workplace investigation and a criminal conviction carry different implications. The word “alleged” provides limited assistance if the remainder of a report presents guilt as settled. Equally, reporting that an investigation upheld specified complaints should not be diluted into the suggestion that there is merely unsupported gossip.

Secondly, an opportunity to respond should be meaningful. The person concerned needs sufficient information about the allegation and a realistic opportunity to address it. The response process should help reveal errors, supply missing context and test the account on which serious conclusions depend. Editors must consider how to make that opportunity effective while protecting confidential sources and preserving their ability to publish matters of public interest. Similar care is owed to complainants confronted with claims that they are dishonest or malicious.

Thirdly, organisations should distinguish immediate protection from final judgment. Safeguarding concerns may justify changes to working arrangements while facts are established. Where practicable, proportionate options might include supervision, temporary reassignment or a defined suspension. The appropriate choice will depend on the seriousness of the risk and the contractual relationship. A final decision should explain the professional grounds relied upon, while a temporary measure should have a review date and criteria for continuation.

Finally, reconsideration should be built into the response from the outset. If important evidence changes, the institution should reassess the original decision and communicate any material correction to those who received its earlier account. If exclusion continues, its reasons should be considered afresh. Where there is no criminal prosecution, reconsideration must turn on a fresh assessment of the evidence and the professional grounds for the decision.

These safeguards also help distinguish public protection from management of an organisation’s image. A company may legitimately care about commercial confidence, but a decision based on anticipated controversy should be described as such. Presenting reputational risk management as though it were an independent finding of fact risks misleading the public and making an affected person’s response unnecessarily difficult.

There is a further issue of access. A system that relies principally on litigation after publication places the burden of seeking redress on the person whose resources and work may already have been affected. Yet expansive liability can also deter legitimate journalism and discourage people from reporting mistreatment. Stronger, proportionate procedures within publishers and commissioning organisations offer a way to reduce avoidable harm without making either silence or expensive litigation the default response.

Conclusion

Trial by media is most troubling where the practical consequences of accusation become detached from the quality of the evidence and the availability of a fair means of answering it. The cases considered demonstrate several routes to that outcome: public vilification during an investigation, loss caused by prolonged uncertainty, workplace sanctions, commercial withdrawal and the amplification of accusations online.

Journalism and workplace investigations perform essential functions in examining conduct and holding institutions to account. Their legitimacy depends on procedures suited to those functions, including careful verification, a fair opportunity to respond and an assessment of whether the consequences are justified by the findings.

The more persuasive standard is proportionality between evidence, process and consequence. Serious allegations warrant careful investigation; serious professional sanctions warrant a fair opportunity to respond, an intelligible justification and reconsideration when the evidence changes. Public accountability gains credibility when those requirements are observed. Its legitimacy is weakened when the visibility of an accusation becomes a substitute for examining its merits.

References

Cases

Allen v United Kingdom [GC], application no 25424/09, judgment of 12 July 2013. European Court of Human Rights judgment.

Bloomberg LP v ZXC [2022] UKSC 5. Judgment.

HM Attorney-General v MGN Ltd and News Group Newspapers Ltd [2011] EWHC 2074 (Admin), [2012] 1 WLR 2408. Judgment.

Khuja v Times Newspapers Ltd [2017] UKSC 49. Supreme Court judgment.

Lachaux v Independent Print Ltd [2019] UKSC 27. Judgment.

McAlpine v Bercow [2013] EWHC 1342 (QB). Judgment.

PPT v Independent Television News Limited and another [2026] EWHC 2818 (KB), judgment of 3 November 2026. Judgment.

Richard v British Broadcasting Corporation [2018] EWHC 1837 (Ch). Judgment.

Serafin v Malkiewicz [2020] UKSC 23. Supreme Court judgment.

Legislation and regulatory materials

Acas (2015), Code of Practice on Disciplinary and Grievance Procedures. Code.

Contempt of Court Act 1981, sections 1–5 and Schedule 1. Act.

Defamation Act 2013, sections 1, 2 and 4. Act.

European Convention on Human Rights, Articles 2, 3, 6, 8 and 10, reproduced in the Human Rights Act 1998, Schedule 1. Convention rights.

IPSO (2025), Editors’ Code of Practice, clause 1, version effective from 1 January 2025. Code.

Ofcom (n.d.), The Broadcasting Code, Section Seven: Fairness, particularly rule 7.11, and accompanying guidance. Code; guidance.

Related commentary

LawTeacher (2026a), ‘Suicide risk and the right to publish’. Article.

LawTeacher (2026b), ‘PPT v ITN and the Guardian: suicide risk, press freedom and the consequences of publication’. Article.

Academic literature

Entman, R. M. (1993), ‘Framing: Toward clarification of a fractured paradigm’, Journal of Communication, 43(4), pp. 51–58. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.1993.tb01304.x.

Greer, C. and McLaughlin, E. (2011), ‘“Trial by media”: Policing, the 24-7 news mediasphere and the “politics of outrage”’, Theoretical Criminology, 15(1), pp. 23–46. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362480610387461.

Greitemeyer, T. and Sagioglou, C. (2015), ‘Does exonerating an accused researcher restore the researcher’s credibility?’, PLoS ONE, 10(5), e0126316. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0126316.

Haesevoets, T., Reinders Folmer, C. and Brebels, L. (2025), ‘Guilty when proven innocent? The lingering negative effects of false accusations on trust and organizational decision-making’, Journal of Business and Psychology, 40(4), pp. 833–857. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10869-024-09992-1.

Trottier, D. (2017), ‘Digital vigilantism as weaponisation of visibility’, Philosophy & Technology, 30(1), pp. 55–72. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13347-016-0216-4.

Parliamentary evidence and case sources

Banijay UK (2025), ‘Banijay UK release findings of Gregg Wallace investigation’, 14 July. Statement.

House of Commons Home Affairs Committee (2015), Police bail, HC 962, Session 2014–15. Report. Relevant material appears at paragraphs 12 and 28–31.

ITV News (2025a), ‘Over 40 allegations upheld against Gregg Wallace, including “unwelcome physical contact”’, 14 July. Report and Wallace’s response.

ITV News (2025b), ‘John Torode responds after he is sacked as MasterChef presenter over upheld racism allegation’, 15 July. Report and statements.

Penguin (2026), John & Lisa’s Weeknight Dinners, John Torode and Lisa Faulkner, Quadrille, publication date 24 September 2026. Publisher’s catalogue entry.

Sky News (2025), ‘David Walliams dropped by publisher HarperCollins UK after allegations of inappropriate behaviour’, 19 December. Report and party statements.

Snow, M. (2026), ‘HarperCollins drops David Walliams backlist’, The Bookseller, 18 September. Report.

Sources and reported developments considered to 3 November 2026.