Suspects of crime have a reasonable expectation of privacy up until the point they are charged and this expectation is not dependant on the type of crime or characteristics of the suspect, the Court of Appeal has held
The court dismissed Bloomberg’s appeal, in ZXC v Bloomberg [2020] EWCA Civ 611, where the news service had sought to have reporting restrictions lifted on a story about a US businessman allegedly under investigation.
Delivering his judgment, Lord Justice Simon said: ‘The suspicion may ultimately be shown to be well-founded or ill-founded, but until that point the law should recognise the human characteristic to assume the worst (that there is no smoke without fire); and to overlook the fundamental legal principle that those who are accused of an offence are deemed to be innocent until they are proven guilty.’
