Lawyers acting for disgraced broadcaster Stuart Hall sought to shelter their client from his crimes by invoking the Leveson report’s call to keep the identity of suspects anonymous until they are charged, it has emerged.
The move for secrecy was made despite many of his victims only gaining the courage to come forward courtesy of the oxygen of publicity provided by the case and others, raising fresh questions about the proper balance of protections for individuals and victims.
Hall was charged with indecently assaulting thirteen girls in the 1970s and 1980s, despite repeated forceful protestations of innocence.
When first charged his solicitor said: “Stuart Hall is innocent of these charges. It is a matter of concern that in the week following the publication of the Leveson report, there appears to have been systematic leaks to the media which have given a misleading impression of what this case is about."
At the time Leveson argued that the only exception to granting anonymity should be in cases where there was ‘an immediate risk to the public’ but legal experts have always questioned this view.
Alan Collins, a solicitor representing victims of Jimmy Savile’s, noted: “Were it not for the exposure of Savile, he [Hall] would probably be carrying on living in peaceful retirement. The concern is if there is further regulation in this area, the media will feel, consciously or subconsciously, restrained from reporting further."
In a separate case a Warwickshire Police have conceded that they were wrong to withhold the identity of a police officer accused of stealing £113k, naming him as Paul Andrew Greeves, 54.