Terror contempt charges dismissed

PHIL REID/Dominion Post

TIM PANKHURST: 'We always believed we had an arguable defence to publishing the intercepted material.'

CRAIG SIMCOX/Dominion Post

DAVID COLLINS: The Solicitor-General's case was dismissed.

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Fairfax Media has been found to have not been in contempt of court for publishing articles which quoted transcripts of conversations police secretly recorded in an investigation into military-style training camps in the Ureweras.

Top High Court judge Tony Randerson and senior judge Warwick Gendall today dismissed the case brought against Dominion Post editor Tim Pankhurst and the newspaper's publisher Fairfax, whose other publications include The Press and the Stuff website.

Solicitor-General David Collins, QC, had alleged the fair trials of 19 people facing weapons charges could have been prejudiced, but the judges did not agree. "We do not consider that the accused are likely to be prejudiced by the publications in relation to their defences," they said.

However, they said the articles breached some suppression orders and the law banning unauthorised publication of extracts from intercepted communications. Prosecution for both these types of breach would be a matter for the police rather than the Solicitor-General, the court said.

It indicated that even though Fairfax had won, it was unlikely to look favourably on any application for costs against the Solicitor-General.

"Our primary contention was that it was possible for the right of free expression to co-exist with the right to a fair trial," Mr Pankhurst said.

"That was an assessment which had to be made at the time of publication."

Fairfax group editor John Crowley said the company acknowledged the significance of the comments made by the judges and would take time to study these in detail.

"The police raids were unprecedented in modern history," he said.

"Fairfax and The Dominion Post's position throughout has been that in publishing we put the issue in perspective for the public, taking away much of the perceived menace that was abroad as a result of the fragmented coverage of a major event."

Mr Pankhurst said that within the coverage the newspaper strived to reach a fair balance between the rights of the public to know and the right to a fair trial.

"We fully appreciated the significance of our publication and no decisions were made lightly," he said.

"We acknowledge the criticism levelled at us by the court regarding breach of suppression and breach of section 312K of the Crimes Act relating to publication of intercepted material.

"On the former the situation regarding suppressions was confused and we were not fully aware of all those in place.

"And we always believed we had an arguable defence to publishing the intercepted material and in fact the police did investigate but decided not to prosecute."

- © Fairfax NZ News