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November 14, 2013

TNT administrators to pay Tulisa £42,500 damages over sex-tape pic

By PA Media Lawyer

Singer Tulisa Contostavlos has accepted £42,500 damages from news website TNT over its publication of a still from a sex tape which appeared in breach of an injunction.
The settlement emerged during a hearing at London's High Court about the legal costs arising from breach of privacy proceedings brought by the 25-year-old against a number of defendants in March last year.
TNT took the still down as soon as it knew an injunction had been granted but it had already been viewed 9,000 times.
Today, Mr Justice Dingemans was told it was the only mainstream publisher to publish a still, and that this had encouraged people to look for illegal copies of the video, but TNT had said the still added nothing to the story and the public would have been aware of the video from other coverage.
The judge heard that, after an admission of liability, TNT made an offer of £42,500 compensation which was accepted and, although it had since gone into administration, its insurers were willing to pay the sum.
In July last year, Miss Contostavlos won an apology from her ex-boyfriend, rap artist Justin Edwards, who initially denied being responsible for the tape appearing on the web.
On that occasion, solicitor Jonathan Coad told the High Court that the invasion of her privacy ''was of the most severe kind imaginable''.
He said she had been particularly distressed by the wholly untrue allegation made by some that she was in some way complicit with the release of the footage.

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