Mirror fined £75,000 over Leeds trial

The Sunday Mirror was today ordered to pay a £75,000 fine for contempt of court in publishing an article that led to the collapse of the Leeds United footballers' trial.

The paper was also ordered to pay the £54,000 costs of bringing the contempt proceedings at the High Court by the Attorney General.

The paper published an interview with the father of the victim of a street attack in Leeds while the jury was considering its verdicts in the trial of Lee Bowyer and Jonathan Woodgate. The trial had to be halted and a second take place as a result.

Today Lord Justice Kennedy, sitting with Mrs Justice Rafferty, said the Mirror's strict liability contempt of court was "towards the top end" of the scale in seriousness.

He also criticised the paper's executives for providing an "incomplete" explanation for what had gone wrong and stated that culpability for the contempt was wider than just the "two or three lawyers" the paper claimed had been at fault.

In the high-profile trial of the Leeds United players the trial judge and both Crown and defence lawyers stressed there was no evidence of a racial motive for the brutal attack on Asian student Sarfraz Najeib. However the victim's father, Mohammed Najeib, said in the article he believed racism was a factor.

In the second trial, also at Hull Crown Court, Bowyer was cleared of all charges. Woodgate was convicted of affray and sentenced to 100 hours of community service.