Ex-racing boss loses privacy bid at European court

[May 10, 2011]  LONDON (AP) -- An ex-car racing boss who sued a tabloid over a story about his sadomasochistic orgy with a handful of dominatrixes lost his privacy case in the European Court of Human Rights on Tuesday -- a ruling applauded by free speech advocates.

Max Mosley won a suit against Britain's News of the World for its 2008 front-page story claiming the then-president of the governing body overseeing Formula One racing had an hours-long Nazi-themed orgy with five women. Mosely, the son of a former fascist leader, acknowledged the orgy but denied the Nazi theme.

Despite winning sizable damages and legal costs, Mosley didn't stop there.

He took the case to the European court, which can intervene in British court rulings, claiming that his privacy rights protected under the European Convention on Human Rights should force news organizations to notify subjects before publishing lurid details of their private lives.

But the court disagreed, saying European law didn't require pre-notification and that such a requirement could have a chilling effect on freedom of speech.

"This is just about whether the newspapers should have the right to publicize very private aspects of people's lives which there's no public interest in at all," Mosley told the British Broadcasting Corporation after the ruling. He may appeal the ruling.

Privacy has become the latest buzz word in Britain -- a string of male celebrities and sports figures have been granted recent injunctions to hide details of their extramarital affairs only to find that the orders were rendered useless with US-registered social media sites, which are largely exempt from such British court orders.

One anonymous Twitter user this week named several of the people who had fought to keep their identity secret.

British judges have often issued injunctions or gagging orders to prevent names or details from being published in privacy cases, but they can also issue super-injunctions to prevent journalists or others from even reporting that a hearing took place.

Unlike the United States where freedom of speech is protected by the Constitution and often trumps privacy arguments, European privacy law is vague -- the right to private and family life is protected, but so is the right of expression.

"What we have in Europe is a very broad interpretation of privacy, which has serious ramifications for freedom of speech," said Jo Glanville with Index on Censorship, a London-based anti-censorship group. "I'm not sure what Parliament could do to on this because it still comes down to judges to decide what constitutes privacy."

Had Mosley won, the ruling could have had huge implications, not only for news organizations who pursue public interest Mosley but also on non-governmental organizations which expose everything from corrupt dictators to lawmakers embroiled in expense scandals.

"This is very welcome news for the media," said lawyer Robin Shaw. "The obligation to give prior notification would not have been restricted to stories about the sexual behavior of people in the public eye, such as Mr. Mosely, but would potentially have embraced any story about an individual, however seemingly innocuous."

___

Online:

http://www.echr.coe.int/echr/

[Associated Press; By PAISLEY DODDS]

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.