A Northern Ireland law granting anonymity to people suspected of sexual offences until they are charged is not compatible with human rights or press freedom, a judge has said.
The law, which came into effect in Northern Ireland in 2023, granted anonymity for life, and for 25 years after death, to suspects who hadn’t been charged.
Media organisations joined forces in an attempt to have sections of the Justice (Sexual Offences and Trafficking Victims) Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 declared legally invalid.
Mr Justice Humphreys told Belfast High Court that a fair balance between competing rights had not been struck by the act.
It had been argued during the judicial review that victims of sexual assault could be jailed if they publicly named their suspected abusers.
The court had also heard that the law meant not only that victims could be criminalised but that suspects could not publicly deny allegations.
The judge told the court that there should be a fair balance between privacy and freedom of expression.
He said the law represented a “disproportionate interference with the article 10 rights of the applicants”, which included the Belfast Telegraph, Irish News, The Times and the BBC.
He added that public interest journalism serves a vital role in any democratic society.
He told the court that legislative interrogation of this part of the act as it made its way through the Stormont assembly was “manifestly lacking”.
And there had been a “lack of proper debate and scrutiny” around it.
He added that interference with article 10 rights “requires the most anxious scrutiny”.
Such a law does not exist in any other part of the UK.
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