Adjudication No. 111 (August 1981) [1981] APC 24

ADJUDICATION No. 111 (August 1981)

The Australian Press Council has received a complaint from the Director of the Department for Community Welfare of Western Australia about an article published on page two of the Sunday Independent of November 16, 1980, headed "Girl Leaps to Death" and introduced by a paragraph on page one headed "Why Did She Die?"

In both places the girl, aged 15, was said to have been on the run from the Community Welfare Department, that she was pregnant, and that she may have leapt to her death because of a misunderstanding. The article added that she had been left by her parents who were in the UK, that she was a ward of the State, that she had run away from a placement home and that she plunged from a fourth floor flat where she was hiding.

The director denies that the girl was on the run and that she was pregnant -- he says that the inquest established that she was not -- and he objects to the fact being stated that she was a ward of the State. He quotes the girl's mother as denying that she had left the girl. He conceded that he would have not objected to a responsible and accurate report, but complains that the report was factually incorrect and sensationally presented in such a way as to cause distress and disquiet to the girl's guardian, the department, the girl's mother and other people.

The managing editor in reply relies upon the fact that a friend of the girl had told a reporter the alleged facts which the director denies and that the reporter assessed her as reliable and as telling the truth.

The Press Council is of opinion the paper was seriously at fault in reporting as facts allegations for which it had only one person's word, which had no support from persons such as departmental officers and the girl's guardian, and as to which inquiries could easily have been made.

The allegations were of a particularly distressing kind when read in the light of the tragic circumstances of the girl's death.

The complaint is upheld and the paper is severely censured.