Witness Statement of Richard Peppiatt

8/3/2019 Witness Statement of Richard Peppiatt

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My n ame is R ichard Peppiatt and m y last full time newspaper position was asa reporter at the Daily S tar, where I had wo rked for over two years. Beforethen I worked for six months at a news agency called Ferraris, which did legwork for the mainly tabloid press. P rior to that role I freelanced for the M ail onSunday as a reporter for roughly five months, as well as freelancing for avariety of o ther tabloid titles.I would describe corporate governance at the Daily Star as laissez-faire atbest. The re was little or nothing in the way of docum ents or official policiesgoverning conduct. I was never asked or offered the opportunity to sign acode of conduct, nor did their exist to my knowledge an employee handbooktype resource to reference. The PCC Code w as not something that I everheard referenced in relation to how a story should be handled, althoughcertain limitations such as not trespassing in hosp itals we re implicitlyacknowledged. I ha ve adm itted that some stories I wrote at the Daily Starwere wholly inaccurate, often written under pressure from superiors to distortthe facts at hand. For me to have referenced the PCC Code to protest againstthis I would have been laughed out the door. That was the level of esteem thePCC held in the newsroom, both before and after Richard Desmo nd withdrew.Tabloid editors often talk of the "shame" they feel at a PCC adjudication, but -and I w ont pull any pun ches here - theyre lying. They couldnt care less whatthe PCC thinks, or about having to occasionally print a three paragraphcorrection. The transaction be tween new spaper and reader has alreadyoccurred, and the effect of that story is rarely diminished by a retractionmonths later. Getting the occasional slap on the wrist was just a cost of doingbusiness.I was only a reporter, so I was no t privy to all discussions, but the impression Igot from m ore senior colleagues and personal observation was that RichardDesmonds biggest interest is in the business, rather than journalistic, side ofhis newspapers, which is to say editorial decisions are dictated more from theaccounts and advertising departments than the new sroom floor. The net effectof this is that stories which sell well (e.g. about Katie Price) had to be sourcedon a da ily basisi whether there wa s a tale to tell or not. This naturally led tofabrication in order to fulfill an unrealistic quo ta. Much more insidious waswhen this same philosophy was applied to stories involving Muslims andimmigrants, when yet again a top down pressure to unearth stories whichfitted w ithin a certain narrative (immigran ts are taking over, M uslims are athreat to security) led to casual and system ic distortions. In sho rt, ethicalconcerns w ere always subse rvient to financial ones. C irculation felt like thema in moral arbiter. This corporate self-interest is the reason that theDesm onds titles are constantly promoting each others products. Thenewspapers have given obscene am ounts of coverage to Big Brother and theHealth Lottery in recent months, far in excess of their respective news values.I resigned from the Daily Star in March, so it was before the phone hackingstory really exploded. P rior to that the occasional gurg le of interest in red topbehaviour had no discernible impact on Daily Star newsroom practices. Thismay be because private investigators were not routinely em ployed to myknowledge. Only on one occasion I asked a m ore senior colleague if he could

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help me find a telephone num ber and address for a wom an I wanted to speakto with regard a story, after having no luck through databases such asTraceSm art. He told me he d phone som eone and a few hours later a list ofphone num bers and possible addresses were read out to me (none of which,it transpired were correct, I might add). I do not know for certain anythingillegal occurred on that occasion, although m y instinct at the time was that itwas n ot wholly above board. I can say with confidence the D aily Star were farsmaller users of p rivate investigators than their rivals. This w as no t a m atter ofethics, but of comparative budgets. They were often happy to let other papersdo the dirty work, then just follow up their coverage. The ma jority of storiesappearing in the Daily Star are sourced from the news w ires or plagarisedfrom other newspapers, in particular the Daily Mail, which is such a heavyinfluence that for the most part it dictated the Daily Stars news agend a.In addition to the major news a gencies such as Reuters, PA an d AssociatedPress there are dozens of local agencies dotted around the country supplyingcontent to the na tional press. Som e of this content is lifted from localnewspapers, or sourced from agency reporters own contacts. Other storiesstill are concocted from PR content. Often national newspapers w ill also hireagency repo rters to cover a story for them on their patch. I am no t going tospeculate too m uch into the behaviour of news agencies, because each is runin an idiosyncratic manner. Bu t it is fair to say that in a highly com petitivemarket in which agencies are competing to get their stories used by thenational press, there is an obvious financial incentive in making your storiesstand out from the crowd, and so the temptation to spin or embellish a storyalways exists. One obvious consequence of reporters cannibalising the workof other journalists is that the former is often wholly unaware of the ve racity oftheir information. Som etimes the maxim that a story is "too good to check"comes into play, and in this manner falsehoods can easily becomepropagated across the media.PRs o ften find channe ling their content through news agencies is a goodtechnique to get the attention of newsdesks, but they also deal directly withthe national newspapers. PR firms give ge nerous encouragem ent to editors torun stories featuring their clients. This can take the form of gifts, ranging fromfood and alcohol through to free holidays (as a lowly reporter I went on fourfree holidays in two years for helping push stories from certain PR firms andcompanies, with more senior employees often doing even better than that).Other stories are obtained from phone-ins or emails from members of thepublic, who are often seeking money for selling their tale, and of coursetraditional reporting, as in reacting to breaking news events, either byheading to the incident yourself or gathering information from T V, internet andradio or the newswires. Another way stories appear in the Daily Star (and theyare not alone) are when they are simply made up, or based on such scant,dubious evidence as to essentially be untrue. I list in my resignation letter(attached) a num ber of stories that I wrote via this method, in the fullknow ledge, and on occasion request, of superiors. Most, but not all, of thefabricated stories featured the Daily Stars most referenced celebrities - KatiePrice, Peter Andre, Kerry Katona e tc. These peoples careers aresymb iotically linked to tabloid column inches, and therefore they were veryunlikely to sue over false stories. Their management are begrudgingly aware

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that their coverage in the tabloid press is likely to see-saw, sometimes theydreceive weeks of good press, sometimes w eeks of bad. W ithout that, readersquickly becom e bored. For a period of about six m onths I believe Katie Priceappeared on the front cover of the D aily Star nearly every day. This was notbecause her life is that much of a rollercoaster, but because reporters wereput under imm ense pressure to think up new lines about her personal life ona daily basis. Often this involved collusion with Katie Prices PR team (w ho,aware the D aily Star wo uld write about her a nyway, ha d a ve sted interest inhelping out in return for a positive spin). Failing this, a story was oftenconcocted off the back of flimsy evidence e.g K atie Price appearing in publicwithout her wedding ring mean t her marriage was ove r, even if there wa s noother evidence to back that statement up. To circumvent this issueunattributed source quotes make up much of the story, verifying the angletaken. Although unnam ed sou rces are a valuable journalistic tool to protectsources, often in my experience of tabloids they are simply made up by thereporter to increase the word count and add a veneer of legitimacy tosomething that is speculation, at best.Another ethically dubious technique used by the Daily Star (and othertabloids, if not to the same ridiculous degree) is the overplayed headlines thatmisrepresent the truth of the story beyond. It is such an endemic problem atthe Daily Star that most days a comparison of the front page with the storyinside is bordering on the com edic. One recent example claimed TV KINGCO W ELL IS DE AD . The story inside was about him leaving X Factor. Thisbehaviour is purely a cynical ploy to encourage consumers to purchase theDaily Star over rivals. Often lacking a real scoop to encourage this, theysimply pretend to have one. Its a con, plain and simple. The Daily Express isno be tter at this. Particularly distasteful are their front page c laims of "m iraclecures" for cancer/Alzheimers/Parkinsons, which upon c loser analysis aresimply initial trials on mice, with many years of research ahead before theycan even be considered m edically sound. This type of m isleadingsensationalism deliberately plays on offering false hope to people w hose liveshave b een affected by such illnesses, all in order to sell their paper.Reporters, including myself, were often unhappy about som e of the stories w ewere p ressured to write. Certain executives w ould often overplay the strengthof a story in editorial conference to please the editor, but would then lean onthe reporter tasked w ith writing it to make the story fit wha t theyd pitched.This was the case w ith the infamous "Muslim Only Loos" story, where a strongnews line w as decided b efore the facts we re known i.e. thatthere wa s onlyone squat toilet and it wasn t paid for with taxpayer m oney. W hen later in theday these facts did becom e clear they were simply ignored.To cite another example of this pragmatic approach to truth, at the beginningof October 2009 the TV star Matt Lucas ex husband, Kevin McG eecomm itted suicide. That day the news desk got a call from a me mber of thepublic who claimed to know McG ee and the reasons behind the death. Thiscall was passed to me and I noted dow n what he said, and informed the new sdesk, who were very keen to run the story. I tried arranging to meet thesource, but he said he wa s at unavailable for the next few da ys. I made the

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news desk aw are of unease of taking this mans (quite sensational claims) atface value w ithout at least feeling him out in person, especially considering hispreoccupation seeme d to be mainly with how m uch money wed pay him.How ever, the decision was taken b y the news ed itor/editor to run the story onthe front page regardless. The next mo rning a letter arrived from Matt Lucassolicitors threatening legal action. That sam e morning the source a lso calledback, claiming he w as in touch with Matt Lucas and had som e mo reinformation to sell. Again he wa s unava ilable to me et, and again, thenewsdesk decided to run his story. To this day, Ive never me t the man inquestion, and have no idea if he had insider info, or was just a fantasist. Iunderstand that Matt Lucas did sue over the stories, and a significant sum o fmoney was paid out. I expec ted to be disciplined (at the very least) for my partin the incident (not because I felt particularly culpable, but because b lametends to travel downhill) but was surprised when the whole thing wa s treatedjust like a cost of doing bus iness, and it was ba rely mentioned again at all.It seemed to me that reporters employment contracts were structuredspecifically to limit the possibility of any ethical protest. Many, includingmyself, were on casua l contracts, which is to say they can be terminated atanytime. The spectre of being let go at any mom ent is a powerful deterrentagainst sticking your head above the trench if you disagree w ith somethingthat is occurring. Even if someone w as bold enough to complain, no channelexisted for emp loyees to raise concerns about ethical or journalistic practices.My feeling was certainly that the further up the chain of command you wentthe less, not more, concern over newsroom behaviour existed.In a broader sense, Richard Desm onds investment in his newsroomoperation was/is woeful, and this has resulted in too few reporters toadequ ately do their job. I recollect one day there be ing just myself and twoother reporters to write the whole new spaper. We were forced to usepseudonyms just to make it appear to readers there were m ore of us. Any factchecking etc goes out the window w hen you have such a heaving workload.Discretionary payments w ere sometimes m ade to reporters for exclusivestories. On one occasion the new s editor of the day offered 150 to whateverreporter could come up w ith a story to fill page 3 (I was left in no doubt thatby his phrasing he w as not conce rned for the storys veracity, for it was 6 pmon a S unday and he wanted to go ho me). I invented a story about model KellyBrook see ing a hypnotist to help her get ready quicker, and was duly paid thebonus.For me the true face of the Daily Star was exposed when I resigned from thepaper, leaking my letter to the Guardian. A crisis managem ent PR firmOutside Organisation (who n ow look after Channel 5s PR m ore broadly) wereemp loyed to deal with the fall out. One techn ique used w as to contact othernewspapers and a ttempt to discredit me. It filtered back through friends in theindustry that they were spreading the rumour that I had been stealing moneymeant for sources, and that I was disgruntled after being turned down forpromotion, that I wasnt a qualified journalist, hadnt worked for otherorganisations as I claimed - and even that I was a drug addict. None of thesethings are in the slightest bit true, but some continue to be repeated by D ailyStar execu tives to this day. I very much expect they will repea t them in

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evidence to you, and I therefore attach w ith this statement m y N CTJcertificate, proof of employment from all the news organisations I havementioned, and a cuttings screen-grab show ing the numb er of stories I w rotewhile at the Daily Star (around 850). They h ave also taken the d efense that Imay have m ade up stories and acted unethically, but I was a lone "roguereporter", and that I am not a reflection of their newsroom culture. To answerthis I need do nothing more than refer you to a list complied by RoyGreenslade o f the scores of libels and apo logies the D aily Star have admittedin recent years (also attached). In many they admit what they printed waswholly untrue. My name appears now here near the vast majority.After resigning from the Daily Star I suffered a campaign of harassment andthreats to my person, which likely included my phone being hacked. Withinhours of the Guardian informing the Daily Star that they were preparing topublish my resignation letter, the threatening phone calls, text messages andemails began. They ranged from "W ere doing a kiss and tell on you" and"Change your voicemail message" to "Y oure a marked m an until the day youdie" and "RD will get ya" (a reference, Im certain, to Richard Desm ond). Theharassment became so persistent that I sent my girlfriend to go stay with afriend, and called in the police. When this step was publicised in the Guardian,the harassme nt stopped, but not before the details of a voicem ail messageleft by a friend was e mailed to me, and the messa ge itself apparently deleted.I see no w ay that the information could have b een know n unless my voicemailhad been accessed. The police have now traced the source of thisharassment and g iven him a w arning. He is a person linked to the tabloidworld but that I have never m et, and who w ould therefore not have the in-depth personal information he possesses without seeming collusion from theDaily Star/Outside Organisation. I am currently pursuing a civil claim againstthe individual to force him to reveal wh o ordered his beha viour toward me.To conclude, although the Daily Star did not to my kn owledge engag e inphone hacking o r use private investigators, it is my a ssertion that theirjournalistic ethics are just as corrupted. The truth (and by this I mean a mo ral,as opposed to legalistic truth) is treated with such flippancy, and theirmo tivations so capitalistic as opposed to journa listic, as to be a primeexam ple of the gross irresponsibility that has eng ulfed this countrys tabloidpress, and for which I am ashamed to have been part of.

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Witness Statement of Richard Peppiatt

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