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‘Calculated risk’ costs media including Nine and News Corp $1.1m in fines

Australian media publications including News.com.au, The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Daily Telegraph, Business Insider, Mamamia, as well as programs The Today Show and 2GB Breakfast, have been handed down a combined $1.1 million in fines for breaching contempt of court laws,  over reporting of Cardinal George Pell’s sexual abuse trial.

In February this year the media outlets pleaded guilty to breaching contempt of court laws, with part of a plea deal leading to certain charges being dropped, including charges against editors at some of those outlets. The ruling was handed down this morning.

The charges were in relation to the way in which the outlets first covered the trial of Cardinal George Pell in December 2018, contrary to a proceeding suppression order.

Of the fines, the largest was handed down to The Age Company, now part of Nine Entertainment Co, at $450,000. News Life Media, part of News Corp Australia, was fined $400,000 while former Fairfax Media Publications, now owned by Nine, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian Financial Review, received a combined $162,000 fine.

Other fines included Radio 2GB at $10,000 (formerly Macquarie Radio now Nine), Allure Media (publisher of Business Insider and owned by Nine) at $10,000, Mamamia at $20,000 and Queensland Newspapers (The Courier Mail) and The Geelong Advertiser at $1,000 each.

Victoria Supreme Court Justice John Dixon said the media had taken a ‘calculated risk’ and that The Age and News Life Media in particular had “…constituted a blatant and wilful defiance of the court’s authority, as each took a deliberate risk by intentionally advancing a collateral attack on the role of suppression orders in Victoria’s criminal justice system”.

His Honour further determined that the timing of the media respondents’ pleas of guilty, which were made at trial, did not demonstrate any significant degree of remorse and contrition, but were entered to protect their individual journalist, presenter and editor employees.

Justice Dixon did not accept the Director of Public Prosecutions’ submission that the reports were published to deliberately pressure the trial judge prior to determining the media’s
application, after the verdict, to review the suppression order.

The respondents were also ordered to pay the applicant’s costs in the sum of $650,000, as agreed by the parties in the plea agreement, a matter that was also taken into account on sentence.

Nine declined to comment on the fines, while News Corp did not respond in time for publication.

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