The privacy order bans The Sun on Sunday from publishing details of a well-known man’s alleged “extramarital sexual activities”, described in documents as a threeway sexual encounter. The man is identified in court documents as PJS.
Legal experts now believe the ruling could lead to a rush of the rich and famous applying for gagging orders, which typically cost between £50,000 and £70,000.
Robin Shaw, a consultant specialising in media-related litigation at law and professional services firm Gordon Dadds, said: “PJS’ success will likely lead to a rapid increase in applications for privacy injunctions by (rich) celebrities and (rich) individuals together with an outcry from the press about what they will call the farcical supposed suppression of information that is known around the globe.”
Mark Stephens, a media lawyer for the firm Howard Kennedy LLP, said the globally famous people who are seeking injunctions must understand they now run the risk of their stories and identities being published in the US and other countries.
Mr Stephens told the Independent: “I think that what the Supreme Court has attempted to do is put a wooden stake through the heart of the kiss and tell story. And of course, they have been effective at that in relation to c-list celebrities, but in relation to global celebrities they have failed because stories are going to other parts of the planet and, as a result, we will be in a position where we still read about these things on the internet.”
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News Group Newspapers (NGN) won the first round of the legal battle in January when a High Court judge refused to impose an injunction preventing the paper from identifying PJS. But then PJS challenged the decision and Court of Appeal judges ruled in his favour, concluding the couple’s young children would be the subject of intensified media scrutiny as a result of publishing the story.
The Sun on Sunday returned to court and asked for the ban to be withdrawn after the couple were identified by publications in Scotland and the US. Justices ruled in the paper’s favour, concluding that "much of the harm which the injunction was intended to prevent has already occurred.” PJS then took his case to the Supreme Court and a temporary injunction was put in place until the decision is made.
Four of the panel of five Supreme Court justices decided that there was an “absence on present evidence” of “any genuine public interest” that could justify publishing PJS' identity.
In their ruling, the justices said publishing the story is “contrary to the interests of PJS’s children”.
“It is essential to distinguish between the claims for breach of privacy and for breach of confidence," their ruling said. "The widespread availability of the information in the public domain may well mean that PJS would face difficulties in obtaining a permanent injunction in so far as his claim is based on confidentiality, but different considerations apply to privacy claims, where the impact of any additional disclosure on the likely distress to PJS and his family, and the degree of intrusion or harassment, continues to be highly relevant.
“The Court of Appeal also referred to a ‘limited public interest’ in the story when it had rightly held that there was none in its earlier judgment. There is not, on its own, any public interest in the legal sense in the disclosure of private sexual encounters even if they involve infidelity or more than one person at the same time, however famous the individual(s) involved.”
They said an injunction pending the outcome of any trial was “appropriate” to protect PJS, his partner and their children against “further invasion of privacy”. This means that an injunction will remain in place pending a trial of the issue, which is expected to take place later this year.
Additional reporting by Press Association
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