by Nathan Sparkes and Alice Watkins After a weekend of frontpage stories in The Sun newspaper, which accused a high profile BBC presenter of exchanging payment for pornographic images from an adult, a lawyer representing the person in question has now come forward to denounce the stories. The Sun first reported allegations on Friday that a BBC presenter had paid a teenager for sexually explicit photos. But a lawyer representing the young person who sold the images told the BBC that "nothing inappropriate or unlawful" took place. The statement also asserted that the young person had sent a denial to The Sun, before it published the claims.
Before these details came to light, The Sun called for an investigation in the BBC and claimed the broadcaster had “nine questions to answer”.Now we know more about The Sun’s conduct, it has become clear they have questions of their own to answer:
If Sun journalists and editors covering the story did stray from their own set of editorial standards, or they failed to consider the ethical consequences of publication, this would prove once again that, at The Sun, nothing has changed since the Leveson Inquiry.It has the appearance of a story driven by an anti-BBC agenda, rather than the public interest. In pursuit of this agenda, they have seemingly launched into reckless publication without clarifying or setting out the full facts.That most newspapers, including The Sun, are not independently regulated means they can publish almost anything without accountability.The Sun must come clean on how it came to publish this story. A tough, robust regulator would be encouraging the newspaper to do so.
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