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Baby Jordan film 'censored'
18/08/2005 15:01 - (SA)
Cape Town - A bid by the State to view an e.tv documentary on the murder of baby Jordan Norton before it was broadcast was nothing less than censorship, the station's advocate told the Cape High Court on Thursday.
The Western Cape directorate of public prosecutions is seeking an order that will allow it to preview the documentary, and give it 24 hours to approach the courts for an order to halt its broadcast if necessary.
The documentary, which includes interviews with Jordan's uncle Dylan and nanny, who both saw the killers, was to have been broadcast in the 3rd Degree slot on the evening of August 2.
However with only hours to go, Cape Judge President John Hlophe granted the directorate's urgent application to temporarily halt the broadcast.
Arguing on Thursday, e.tv's senior counsel Gilbert Marcus said the State had not produced a single legal authority for the relief it was seeking.
This was not surprising, given the "extraordinary inroad" it would make on freedom of expression.
"My lord, if that is not censorship I do not know what is," he told acting judge Dumisa Zondi.
Counsel for the directorate Ismail Jamie said that under the Broadcasting Code of Conduct, the right of freedom of expression was limited by the right to a fair trial.
The right to a fair trial applied not only to the accused (five people have been arrested in connection with the June murder) but also to the State, he said.
The directorate was seeking to protect the State's duty and right to prosecute crime effectively.
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