The High Court ruled today that articles published in The Sun and Daily Mirror following the arrest of a suspect by police investigating the killing of landscape architect Joanna Yeates were in contempt of court.

A panel of three judges – which includes Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice – fined the Mirror’s publishers £50,000 and The Sun’s publishers £18,000. Judges had reserved judgment after listening to arguments from all sides at a hearing in London earlier this month.

They said both tabloid newspapers had breached contempt laws in reports about Miss Yeates’s landlord, Christopher Jefferies.