Confidential information

Information as to identity, whereabouts, appearance of murderers following release - injunctions to restrain publication - jurisdiction to grant where disclosure causing serious risk of injury or...Information as to identity, whereabouts, appearance of murderers following release - injunctions to restrain publication - jurisdiction to grant where disclosure causing serious risk of injury or deathVenables and Another v News Group Newspapers and Others: Fam D (Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss): 8 January 2001At the age of 11 the claimants had been convicted of murder, the particularly shocking and distressing facts of which had been widely publicised by the media.

Injunctions restricting publication of information having come to an end on their eighteenth birthdays, they sought injunctions under the inherent jurisdiction which would continue indefinitely to protect their identity, whereabouts, physical appearance and other confidential information on the grounds that their lives would be in danger if such information became public knowledge.Edward Fitzgerald QC and Ben Emmerson QC (instructed by Bhatt Murphy) for the first claimant.

Brian Higgs QC and Julian Nutter (instructed by Lloyd Lee Dures, Liverpool) for the second claimant.

Desmond Browne QC and Adam Wolanski (instructed by Farrer & Co) for the defendants.

Gordon Murdoch QC and Marcus Scott-Manderson (instructed by Official Solicitor) for the Official Solicitor.

Andrew Caldecott QC and Stephen Suttle (instructed by Treasury Solicitor) for the Attorney-General.

Mark Shaw (instructed by Treasury Solicitor) for the Secretary of State for the Home Department.Held, granting the applications, that taking into account the provisions of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, as given effect by the Human Rights Act 1998, the law of confidence could, in exceptional circumstances be applied to protect individuals who were seriously at risk of injury or death if their identity or whereabouts became public knowledge; and that, applying English domestic law and the right to life enshrined in article 2 of the convention, the court had jurisdiction to grant injunctions in cases where it was demonstrated to be necessary and proportionate to the legitimate aim and there was no other way to ensure such protection.