Trial by media

Trial by Media is a phrase popular in the late 20th century and early 21st century to describe the impact of television and newspaper coverage on a person's reputation by creating a widespread perception of guilt regardless of any verdict in a court of law.In the United Kingdom there is a heated debate between those who support a free press which is largely uncensored and those who place a higher priority on an individual's right to privacy and right to a fair trial.During high publicity court cases, the media are often accused of provoking an atmosphere of public hysteria akin to a lynch mob which not only makes a fair trial nearly impossible but means that regardless of the result of the trial the accused will not be able to live the rest of their life without intense public scrutiny.The counter-argument is that the mob mentality exists independently of the media which merely voices the opinions which the public already has.There are different reasons why the media attention is particularly intense surrounding a legal case: the first is that the crime itself is in some way sensational, by being horrific or involving children; the second is that it involves a celebrity either as victim or accused.

History- Although a recently coined phrase, the idea that popular media can have a strong influence on the legal process goes back certainly to the advent of the printing press and probably much further. This is not including the use of a state controlled press to criminalize political opponents, but in its commonly understood meaning covers all occasions where the reputation of a person has been drastically affected by ostensibly non-political publications.

Trial by Media in India- n India, trial by media has assumed significant proportions. Some famous criminal cases that would have gone unpunished but for the intervention of media are Priyadarshini Mattoo case, Jessica Lal case, Nitish Katara murder case and Bijal Joshi rape case. The media however drew flak in the reporting of murder of Aarushi Talwar, when it preempted the court and reported that her own father Dr. Rajesh Talwar, and possibly her mother Nupur Talwar were involved in her murder, thus reviving memories of JonBenet Ramsey murder, which was hauntingly similar. The CBI later declared that Rajesh was not the killer.Between September 2004 and March 2005, the media - print, audio and visual all wrote about His Holiness Sri Jayendra Saraswathi Swamigal, a Hindu religious leader, suggesting his guilt in a murder case, but the High Courts of Madras and Andhra Pradesh and the Supreme Court of India repeatedly found that there was no material evidence to find him guilty and came down heavily on the media and the Government of Tamilnadu for misuse of government machinery.

Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trial_by_media.

Arushi case: A trial by media or a trial of media?

New Delhi: The Arushi Talwar case has raised several troubling questions for the media and the police, questions that strike at the heart of the process of investigation and news reporting.When the CBI finally conceded it could not find any evidence against Talwar, many thought it was all over.But a day later - on Saturday - when Rajesh Talwar walked out of Dasna jail, there was more of the same.Fifty days on, and there's no sign of fatigue, no end in sight to the media frenzy.“Please let me spend some time with my family, in the past 50 days I have not been able to share my grief with anyone,” Talwar said.The murder was a classic whodunit for the media. But it was the UP police that provided fodder for speculation.A press conference addressed by IG Meerut Zone, Gurdarshan Singh, days after the murder added fuel to fire. “Arushi and Hemraj were aware of the extra-marital relationship of Doctor Talwar. And slowly they both developed intimate relationships,” he said.Friends of the Talwar Family, ordinary citizens as well as the Women & Child Development Minister expressed outrage.Renuka Chowdhary demanded Singh be suspended and charged for character assassination of the victim.Faced with a bungling police force, the media, in a way, decided to play cop. The two families - Talwars and Durranis - continued to be taunted and harassed the moment they stepped out of their house, by an army of reporter.After the CBI took over the case on June 1, it added two other suspects. But it was still Rajesh Talwar who was hounded by the media. When his bail application was rejected, most of the media and their viewers felt vindicated.Warnings from CBI Director Vijay Shankar – “We will keep reminding the media what its limits are,” he said – did not help.New versions kept doing the rounds. Media critics say techniques such as reconstructions run the risk of distorting facts.“Any case that is still under investigation, I am not sure if you have the ethical right to do reconstructions and make a crime show out of it,” says media critic, Shohini Ghosh.India records over 30,000 cases of homicide every year and going by that figure, there must have been at least 4,000 cases in the past 50 days. There have been floods, terror attacks and political developments of national significance. But none of these has been able to distract media's attention from the Noida double murders.In fact according to a study conducted by the CMS, special programmes on the case hogged almost 40 hours out of a total 92 hours of prime time between May 16 and June 7.Just how much is too much? Going by the media's continued obsession with the case, it seems even too much is too little.Link:http://ibnlive.in.com/news/arushi-case-a-trial-by-media-or-a-trial-of-media/68748-3.html.

The media in India is one of the freest in the world in terms
of legal constraints. Freedom of expression incorporated in
her Constitution in Article 19(1) remains an important
facilitator for widespread engagement within a democratic
atmosphere. As beautifully remarked by the first Prime
Minister of independent India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru - “I
would rather have a completely free press with all the
dangers involved in the wrong use of that freedom than a suppressed or regulated press.” But
that great man could not foresee the danger involved in the ‘administration of justice’ which is
the very essence of the natural justice and the rule of law or rather he would not have
expected the press to get involved into something which is beyond its limit and ethics too. To
realize the vision of Mr. Nehru, the media has been provided with many freedoms and
immunities so that this fourth pillar of democracy stands tall and strong. But what Lord Atkin
relates with power is also well placed with the notion of liberty. Liberty does corrupt into
license and is prone to be abused. Every institution is liable to be abused, and every liberty, if
left unbridled, has the tendency to become a license which would lead to disorder and
anarchy1. It has to be remembered that freedom of expression is not absolute, unlimited or
unfettered and in all circumstances, as giving on an unrestricted freedom of the speech and
expression, would amount to uncontrolled license.
Media has now reincarnated itself into a ‘public court’ (Janta Adalat) and has
started interfering into court proceedings. It completely overlooks the vital gap between an
accused and a convict keeping at stake the golden principles of ‘presumption of innocence
until proven guilty’ and ‘guilt beyond reasonable doubt’. Now, what we observe is media trial
where the media itself does a separate investigation, builds a public opinion against the
accused even before the court takes cognizance of the case. By this way, it prejudices the
public and sometimes even judges and as a result the accused, that should be assumed
innocent, is presumed as a criminal leaving all his rights and liberty unredressed. If excessive
publicity in the media about a suspect or an accused before trial prejudices a fair trial or results in characterizing him as a person who had indeed committed the crime, it amounts to
undue interference with the “administration of justice”, calling for proceedings for contempt
of court against the media. Unfortunately, rules designed to regulate journalistic conduct are
inadequate to prevent the encroachment of civil rights. The print and electronic media have gone into fierce and ruthless competition, as we
call them ‘aggressive journalism’ that a multitude of cameras are flashed at the suspects or
the accused and the police are not even allowed to take the suspects or accused from their
transport vehicles into the courts or vice versa. The Press Council of India issues guidelines
from time to time and in some cases, it does take action. But, even if ‘apologies’ are directed
to be published; they are published in such a way that either they are not apologies or the
apologies are published in the papers at places which are not very prominent. The most
objectionable part, and unfortunate too, of the recently incarnated role of media is that the
coverage of a sensational crime and its adducing of ‘evidence’ begins very early, mostly even
before the person who will eventually preside over the trial even takes cognizance of the
offence, and secondly that the media is not bound by the traditional rules of evidence which
regulate what material can, and cannot be used to convict an accused. In fact, the Right to
Justice of a victim can often be compromised in other ways as well, especially in Rape and
Sexual Assault cases, in which often, the past sexual history of a prosecutrix may find its way
into newspapers. Secondly, the media treats seasoned criminal and the ordinary one,
sometimes even the innocents, alike without any reasonable discrimination. They are treated
as a ‘television item’ keeping at stake the reputation and image. Even if they are acquitted by
the court on the grounds of proof beyond reasonable doubt, they cannot resurrect their previous image. Such kind of exposure provided to them is likely to jeopardize all these
cherished rights accompanying liberty.2
Earlier, journalism was not under pressure to push up TRP ratings or sales. So the
journalists did their work with serious intent and conviction, with courage and integrity. They
did not pronounce people guilty without making a serious attempt to study the charges,
investigate them, and come to their own independent conclusions, without fear or favor. They
did not blindly print what law enforcers claimed, what the bureaucracy said or what
politicians planted on to them. That is why people trusted them. But now we are seeing a
different self-acquired role of media in form of ‘media trial’. Everyone manipulates the media
to serve their own interests or hurt their rivals. The problem does not lie in media’s exposing
the lacuna of a bad investigation by cops, or mal-performance of the duties ordained to the
civil servants but the eye-brows start to raise when the media ultra vires its legitimate
jurisdiction and does what it must not do. Be it highlighting the sub-judice issues into public
keeping at stake the sanctity of judicial procedures and ‘right to life with dignity’ of accused
and suspects. The media trial has now moved on to media verdict and media punishment
which is no doubt an illegitimate use of freedom and transgressing the prudent demarcation
of legal boundaries. It is necessary to check prejudicial publicity of the subject matter
pending before a court. It should be legally permissible to pass restraint order on the media. Link:http://www.rmlnlu.ac.in/content/devesh_article.pdf.

Lawyers also guilty for trial by media: SC -The Supreme Court on Tuesday expressed reservations on the increasing trend of lawyers giving out bites to news channels and media organisations in an attempt to capture their moment in the spotlight, even in cases pending trial.During the hearing of arguments by amicus curiae Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium in the BMW case, the three-judge bench of Justices B N Aggrawal, G S Singhvi and Aftab Alam observed, “Even counsels with 30 to 40 years’ experience make open remarks on the credibility of X, Y or Z on television. It is shocking. Have we gone so low? (It is) shameful for all of us. They must desist from the suppression of legal principles,” the Bench remarked.Subramaniam, during his submission, also slammed the media for doing “incalculable” damage to the reputation of individuals, including judges, by reporting and telecasting slanderous news without cross-checking facts.Link: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/lawyers-also-guilty-for-trial-by-media-sc/427652/.

Trial By Media: A Legal Dilemma Resolved With Reference To Jessica Lal

Media is regarded as one of the pillars of democracy. Media has wide ranging roles in the society. Media plays a vital role in moulding the opinion of the society and it is capable of changing the whole viewpoint through which people perceive various events. The media can be commended for starting a trend where the media plays an active role in bringing the accused to hook.

Freedom of media is the freedom of people as they should be informed of public matters.[1] It is thus needless to emphasis that a free and a healthy press is indispensable to the functioning of democracy. In a democratic set up there has to be active participation of people in all affairs of their community and the state. It is their right to be kept informed about the current political social , economic and cultural life as well as the burning topics and important issues of the day in order to enable them to consider to form broad opinion in which they are being managed, tackled and administered by the government and their functionaries. To achieve this objective people need a clear and truthful account of events, so that they may form their own opinion and offer their own comments and viewpoints on such matters and issues and select their future course of action. The right to freedom of speech and expression in contained in article 19 of the constitution. However the freedom is not absolute as it is bound by the sub clause (2) of the same article. However the right it freedom and speech and expression does not embrace the freedom to commit contempt of court. [2]

The media has again come in focus in its role in the trial of Jessica lal murder case. The concept of media trial is not a new concept. The role of media was debated in the Priyadarshini Mattoo case and likewise many other high profile cases. There have been numerous instances in which media has been accused of conducting the trial of the accused and passing the ‘verdict’ even before the court passes its judgment. Trial is essentially a process to be carried out by the courts. The trial by media is definitely an undue interference in the process of justice delivery. Before delving into the issue of justifiability of media trial it would be pertinent to first try to define what actually the ‘trial by media’ means. Trial is a word which is associated with the process of justice. It is the essential component on any judicial system that the accused should receive a fair trial. Link:http://www.legalserviceindia.com/article/l237-Trial-By-Media.html.