View all newsletters
Sign up for our free email newsletters

Fighting for quality news media in the digital age.

  1. Archive content
April 3, 2003updated 17 May 2007 11:30am

Photo mix-up was a close call for DoS

By Press Gazette

Dunstable on Sunday was saved from making the same potentially expensive mistake as The Sun by a last minute phone call, writes Jean Morgan.

The Sun apologised this week for printing a photograph supplied by an agency last Saturday of a man called David Gazley whom it had mistakenly identified as Christopher Harris, a convicted serial rapist.

DoS was about to do the same. Harris was from the Dunstable area and a judge had banned him from speaking to children for the rest of his life. The DoS front page was already proofed and almost on its way to the printers when a call from the Norwich agency, which supplied the picture, warned that it was not the right man.

Editor Aylia Fox said: “The agency is normally very reliable. We were about to go to press and we were publishing the picture over four columns on the front page. We had to pull it pronto and put in a boring picture of Dunstable leisure centre where some of the man’s offences had taken place. We had an incredibly lucky escape.

“The Sun can probably afford to make a mistake like that but if it had hit us, a little local paper, goodness knows what would have happened.”

Jean Morgan

Content from our partners
MHP Group's 30 To Watch awards for young journalists open for entries
How PA Media is helping newspapers make the digital transition
Publishing on the open web is broken, how generative AI could help fix it

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

Select and enter your email address Weekly insight into the big strategic issues affecting the future of the news industry. Essential reading for media leaders every Thursday. Your morning brew of news about the world of news from Press Gazette and elsewhere in the media. Sent at around 10am UK time. Our weekly does of strategic insight about the future of news media aimed at US readers. A fortnightly update from the front-line of news and advertising. Aimed at marketers and those involved in the advertising industry.
  • Business owner/co-owner
  • CEO
  • COO
  • CFO
  • CTO
  • Chairperson
  • Non-Exec Director
  • Other C-Suite
  • Managing Director
  • President/Partner
  • Senior Executive/SVP or Corporate VP or equivalent
  • Director or equivalent
  • Group or Senior Manager
  • Head of Department/Function
  • Manager
  • Non-manager
  • Retired
  • Other
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how New Statesman Media Group may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
Thank you

Thanks for subscribing.

Websites in our network