August 2016

C (A Child) [2016] EWCA Civ 798

The facts were that Ben Butler had been convicted for the murder of his six year-old daughter Ellie in June 2016.  In June 2014 King J had been required to make findings of fact about the case by Sutton Children’s Services who wanted to make a decision on the future of Ellie’s younger sibling.  Following his conviction, media organisations applied for the release of King J’s judgment in the family court. 

The High Court ruled that defendants could be prohibited from accessing their facebook accounts, despite this being a violation of their Article 8 rights, because the balance weighed in favour of preserving evidence. 

The plaintiff had sent a sexualised photograph of herself to one of the defendants, at a time when they were in a relationship.  After the relationship ended, the defendants published the photograph.  She asserted that this undermined her independence, her dignity, her right to privacy and was in breach of the Data Protection Act 1998.

A police officer was disciplined after a Police Ombudsman investigation found that he did ‘virtually nothing’ to progress an investigation into an assault on a schoolboy who had extensive injuries after being punched and kicked in 2014.

The Christian Institute and others v The Lord Advocate (Scotland) [2016] UKSC 51