‘Perverse’ situation as British sports stars granted privacy injunction are named in America

THE British system of privacy injunctions has been dismissed as “ludicrous” and “perverse” after four leading sports figures granted anonymity in the UK were named in America.

A US website identified the stars, including a Premier League footballer and manager, as being at the centre of anonymity fights after they were accused of being adulterers.

Blocking software means UK readers cannot access the site but their names have now been circulated online.

One of the sports stars is alleged to have had an affair with a female celebrity when he had a fiancée at the time. In a judgment setting out the reasons for banning identification of another of the stars, Mrs Justice Elizabeth Laing said she was not swayed by arguments that it was in the public interest to name him since he was a sportsman who had never pretended to be a “role model” for “moral philosophers”.

Mark Stephens, a leading media and human rights lawyer at the law firm Howard Kennedy, said: “It is becoming a ludicrous situation now where there is no way of holding back the tide.

“The injunctions are having the perverse impact that they are provoking people to report on something that they would never otherwise report on. Many of these people are virtually un- known as far as Americans are concerned so the purpose of this is to provoke interest and scrutiny from the United Kingdom, and that is a very strange way to carry on.

“It seems to me that these people would be better off taking a one-day hit than trying to cover up their misdemeanours and sexual incontinence and making a disaster out of a crisis.” Earlier in May, a celebrity who wants to stop newspapers naming him in relation to “extra-marital activities” won a Supreme Court fight.

Justices ruled that the Sun on Sunday should be barred from revealing the identity of the man, referred to in court as PJS.