Face all over australia

Last updated on June 10th, 2017 at 06:27 am

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that a prisoner expected to give evidence in the Schapelle Corby smuggling case in Bali fears for his life if he is identified by Australian drug gangs:

A senior member of Corby’s legal team, Vasu Rasiah, said the prisoner, John Patrick Ford, could face retribution when he returned to Australia after testifying that the former Gold Coast beauty student had been wrongly accused.

“We are worried for his safety and if the cameras are going to flag his face all over Australia, by the time he gets back he will be a dead man,” Mr Rasiah said. “We will apply [to close the court].”

So what does the Sydney Morning Herald do? It immediately runs a picture of Ford (and a smaller shot on the front page of the SMH site). So does Brisbane’s Courier Mail, and presumably several other papers in their print editions.

UPDATE. Also in the Daily Telegraph.

1. Ms Corby’s case is also doing wonders for the travel industry.
   “Go to exotic places, be framed, and sentenced to God knows what …”

   Posted by blogstrop on 2005 03 28 at 07:20 AM • permalink

1. What next? Identifying both the judge and witnesses when they shouldn’t?

   Posted by Andjam on 2005 03 28 at 07:23 AM • permalink

1. The next time a journalist lectures me about ethics and rights, I’m going to respond by punching him in the head.

   Posted by murph on 2005 03 28 at 07:43 AM • permalink

1. Unbelievable. I’ll look for full coverage of this on next week’s Media Watch. There’s a Murdoch paper involved so I mght even get lucky.

   Posted by C.L. on 2005 03 28 at 08:40 AM • permalink

1. Reminds me of the time the New York Times ran a piece on moving into Manhattan apartments. They interviewed my friend, a stacked little blond in her late 20’s, and ran… I’m not kidding now… Her full name, age, which floor of which apartment building she was moving into, and a photograph. Should’ve headlined it “Stalkers Welcome!”. It’s still out there on the web, too.

   Posted by Aaron – Freewill on 2005 03 28 at 09:07 AM • permalink

1. It’s as if they don’t want people to testify in future court cases. Unbelievable.

   Posted by Steve Edwards on 2005 03 28 at 10:27 AM • permalink

1. Deny a reporter his coke and see what happens?

   Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 03 28 at 10:45 AM • permalink

1. It makes perfect sense to me: when the gangs murder him, the papers have one more (and better) story; it is like when you buy one and get two for the same price. And they can then also complain that the police cannot keep anyone safe = three-in-one!

   Posted by jorgen on 2005 03 28 at 03:02 PM • permalink

1. I think wtf sums it up nicely.

   Posted by Nic White on 2005 03 30 at 04:24 AM • permalink