Pregnancy 'news' round up

Most of the tabloid newspapers put yet more royal baby news on their front pages on 6 March:

 

The Sun's front page makes it very clear - the Duchess of Cambridge was handed a teddy bear and said:

"Thank you, I will take that for my d...for my baby"

The same quote was used elsewhere.

Two days later and the Mail published a follow-up:

She didn't? With the help of a video of the incident, the Mail reveals that she actually said:

"Is this for us? Awww, thank you so much, it's [very] very sweet of you"

In other words: not much like what was originally reported. Curiously, this didn't make the front pages.

Meanwhile, in other 'pregnancy news', the Daily Star ran the headline 'Mystery of 'pregnant' star Cheryl Cole' on its front page on Saturday.

Here's what happened: a pregnant woman went to see Cheryl Cole in concert. 'So nice to see lovely @CherylCole', she tweeted. Cheryl replied: 'Nice to see you too, you look amazing pregnant'.

The 'mystery' is that anyone thought this meant Cheryl was pregnant, or that this was worthy of a place on the front page of a paper.

The plan to 'scrap' the use of Mr and Mrs...

In October 2012, many column inches were devoted to claims that Brighton and Hove City Council was planning to 'scrap' the terms Mr and Mrs.

The Mirror went with:

The Mail:

The Telegraph:

The Sun's print version carried a photo of Mr and Mrs host Phillip Schofield with a speech bubble saying: 'Welcome to Non Gender and Non Gender', under the headline 'Ban Mr & Mrs!'. Online, the headline was:

There were many other websites that repeated the same claims.

But the story wasn't correct - the Council had not made any recommendations or published any plans at this time. The Council's Trans Equality Scrutiny Panel, who were looking into a range of issues, suggested there was a problem with a set-list of honorifics on online forms - that if you don't select one of the set options, and some trans people do not feel that the titles Mr or Mrs are suitable for them, it could prevent completion of the form. So people could still call themselves Mr or Mrs, but they would have the freedom to choose a title with which they felt most comfortable. 

Jane Fae wrote in the Guardian:

They don't identify as male or female, prefer "Mx" (pronounced "Mix") as title of choice, and feel positively excluded by forms that demand they pick from a limited list of gender-specific titles. It's a small exclusion, but why should they have to put up with such when a remedy is so easily implemented?

The Trans Equality Scrutiny Panel's final report was published in January. Unsurprisingly, it does not recommend scrapping Mr and Mrs, as it explains on page 65:

Given recent press coverage of the subject of honorifics, the Panel would like to make clear that they never had any intention of recommending that the use of honorifics should be removed. The recommendation of this report is aimed at giving more choice to those who do not want to identify as Mr/Ms/Mrs/Dr. It is worth noting that this may not just apply to trans people: others may not choose to use a honorific if given the option.

Recommendation 35: The Panel welcome the addition of the honorific Mx by council benefits staff as giving an alternative option. The Panel recommend that all on-line forms are examined to look at the possibility of additional options, leaving blank or entering the title the individual feels is appropriate to them.

Three weeks on, and neither the Sun, Mirror, Mail nor Telegraph appear to have informed their readers of what has actually been recommended by the Panel. A search of all four websites using terms 'brighton mx' and 'brighton trans' reveals no new articles on this subject since October.  

As the Panel said following the original articles:

We acknowledge and regret that the tone and content of much of the on-line debate over the last week has caused distress and may have damaged the trust we have sought to build up. We condemn the offensive and discriminatory tone of much of that comment, and reiterate that all members of the panel remain committed to transgender equality. We also recognise the need for balanced, fair and accurate media reporting and will be working proactively to encourage this regarding the scrutiny going forward.

(hat-tip to Jane Fae)

'No truth whatsoever'

Five days ago, the Mirror reported that Tour de France winner Bradley Wiggins was:

teaming with Paul Weller and Bruce Foxton on new single.

The article didn't have any confirmation from Wiggins, Weller, Foxton, any of the others said to be involved, or their spokespeople. Just one anonymous source:

A source said: “It’s all incredibly exciting and has been in the pipeline for some time.

“Everything has finally been signed off though, and a date set for mid-February.”

The Mirror's article has now vanished from its website - very possibly as a result of this post on Weller's Official Facebook page:

'No truth whatsoever'.

Mike Dawes at MailOnline, the Huffington Post and the Express all repeated the story based solely, it seems, on the Mirror's anonymous source. There doesn't appear to be have been any fact-checking by any of them - just some copy-and-pasting. The Express article was published after the Weller denial.

Five days on, all three articles remain live and uncorrected.

(Hat-tip to oboogie at MailWatch Forum)

Mirror apologises for 'drug treatment' claims

The Mirror has published this apology to the Earl of Cardigan:

Following Gavin Martin’s music column in our edition of August 17 concerning Bo Bruce, the daughter of the Earl of Cardigan, we would like to make clear that the Earl of Cardigan has never been treated himself in relation to any drug or alcohol problem. We also incorrectly stated that the Earl had checked himself into the same facility that Bo Bruce was treated at and married a nurse who was working there. The Earl’s wife has never been a nurse and we apologize for these errors.

Tripe

On 23 August, the Mirror and the Mail wrote about tripe.

The Mail's Anna Edwards reported:

Now in an attempt to persuade a younger crowd to tuck in, sellers are turning to Facebook and YouTube to convince youngsters it's a tasty dish worth trying.

The Lancashire-based Tripe Marketing Board is pushing for a revival of the 'delicacy' which was popular with impoverished Victorians, but now attracts widespread revulsion.

Both papers quoted the Chairman of the 'Tripe Marketing Board':

Sir Norman Wrassle, the Tripe Marketing Board chairman, said tripe suffers from a poor reputation but the industry is fighting back.

'We have recently invested heavily in our communications strategy, using the social media like Facebook and Youtube to get our message across,' he said.

But one look at the website of the Tripe Marketing Board suggests all may not be what it seems. It includes 'tripe facts' such as:

Prisoners of the Spanish Inquisition were forced to either eat tripe or be burnt at the stake. Many chose the latter

And:

The first tripe takeaway, Tripe Hut, opened in Manchester in 1979. It closed the following year

And:

The Tripe Marketing Board was set up in 1992 to replace The Tripe Council when its CEO, Paul Mellor, left to pursue a solo career.

There's a poll where you can vote on whether you 'hate' or 'loathe' tripe. 

Hardly a good way to market tripe.

Then there's that Chairman, Sir Norman Wrassle. The photo used on the Tripe Marketing Board website looks like an old photo of an old man. That's because it's a photo of Bror Lagercrantz, a Swedish politician who died in 1981.

The small print on the website reveals that LEB Limited is behind it:

We manufacture and sell promotional material, including fridge magnets via William Blunt & Sons.

We are publishers of allegedly humorous books under the TMB Books imprint.

TMB Books - TMB as in Tripe Marketing Board. They've issued an apology for their one book:

the warning on the cover of Forgotten Lancashire And Parts Of Cheshire And The Wirral that the book is “99% fact free” is misleading. The warning should, in fact, read “100% fact free.” TMB Books would like to apologise to all customers who have pointed this out and hopes that this does not spoil their reading enjoyment.

The alarm bells should be ringing for any journalist writing this stuff. But that assumes they bothered looking at the website at all...

(Hat-tip to the Press Gazette, who also covered the recent churnalism involving a base-jumping Michael Fish)

Express and Mirror apologise for photo error

The Express and Mirror have apologised for publishing photos of the Dutch dressage team, rather than the gold medal winners from Team GB, yesterday.

The Mirror says:

In yesterday's Daily Mirror newspaper a picture captioned Great Britain's gold medal winning dressage team was in fact of the Dutch bronze medal trio.

We apologise for the mistaken use of the picture, which was supplied by a normally reputable agency.

The Express has published an article about dressage - 'the sport riding high' - which ends with:

Due to a caption error by a picture agency, some editions of yesterday’s Daily Express showed a photograph of the bronze medal-winning Dutch dressage team instead of the victorious British dressage team. We sincerely apologise for the error.

Express and Mirror illustrate British Olympic success...with photos of the Dutch

The front page of today's Daily Express - the self-proclaimed 'World's Greatest Newspaper' - celebrates Team GB's success at the Olympics. Under the headline '22 CARAT GOLD', the paper says:

Jubliant Team GB was celebrating a sensational Olympic record last night – notching up a glorious total of 22 gold medals.

Sir Chris Hoy rounded off another astonishing day for Britain’s athletes as they scooped four more golds.

There were other triumphs in cycling and dressage and the gruelling triathlon.

They decided to put pictures of all these gold medallists on the front page:

Unfortunately, rather than the gold-medal winning British dressage team, the Express has published a photo of the third-placed Dutch team:

And the Express wasn't the only one - the Mirror used photos of the Dutch team on page seven and on their centre pages (photo from Nick Sutton):

According to Roy Greenslade, Getty sent out the photo wrongly-tagged. But did no-one at the Mirror or Express notice the bright orange collars or the not-very-gold medals and wonder if it was the right team?

(Thanks to Antonia, Martin, Chris and others)

'Another example of Mail Online not bothering to change a word when cutting and pasting stories'

Yesterday, Daily Mirror football writer Simon Bird tweeted:

His article published at 22:30 on 15 June stated:

Everton are trailing Croatia striker Mario Mandzukic - and could land him for a bargain £7million.

The Croatia hitman, one of the stars of Euro 2012 so far with his three goals in two games, could be paired with team mate Nikica Jelavic at Goodison Park.

Mandzukic is on the radar of other Premier League sides too, because he is available at a “fair” price from his German club, Wolfsburg.

The 26-year-old was signed by Wolfsburg's then-coach Steve McClaren - a friend of Everton boss David Moyes' No2 Steve Round - for £6million and has two years left on his contract.

Everton were also interested in him two years ago, when he played for Dinamo Zagreb, and have had Mandzukic watched during the Euros.

His partnership with Jelavic at international level is thriving and could be rekindled on Merseyside.

The article on the Mail's website - which appears under the byline of 'SportsMail Reporter' - was published at 17:46 on 16 June and is a word-for-word copy:

In April, Mail Online publisher Martin Clarke told The New Yorker that his site 'adhered to fair-use rules'.

(Hat-tip to nutts2020)

UPDATE: By 6:25pm on Monday, the Mail's article had been removed.

'Frozen to death'

On 26 April, the Telegraph published the following apology:

An article on 13 February 2012 incorrectly stated that Martin Hoskins had frozen to death on an overnight fishing trip in sub-zero temperatures. In fact, he died of natural causes. We apologise for this mistaken report and for the consequent distress caused to Mr Hoskins's family. 

Seven weeks later, the Mail has published this:

An article on 14 February 2012 incorrectly stated that Martin Hoskins had frozen to death on an overnight fishing trip in sub-zero temperatures. In fact, he died of natural causes. We apologise for this mistaken report and for the consequent distress caused to Mr Hoskins's family.

And the Mirror this:

A headline on 14 February 2012 incorrectly stated that Martin Hoskins had frozen to death on an overnight fishing trip in sub-zero temperatures, although the article made it clear that no cause of death had yet been established. In fact, Mr Hoskins died of natural causes and, contrary to our report, was accompanied on the trip by a friend. We apologise to Mr Hoskins's family for any distress caused.

It is not clear why it took the Mail seven weeks longer to publish the same wording as the Telegraph.

But why did the Mirror say that someone had 'frozen to death' while also admitting 'no cause of death had yet been established'?

Sorry we said you slept with Tony Blackburn

Today, the Mirror published this apology to Lyn Paul:

Following our article of 1 May 2012 in which it was reported that Lyn Paul of the New Seekers was a “conquest” of Tony Blackburn, Ms Paul has contacted us to say that she merely shared a dinner date with Tony Blackburn and neither slept with him nor had a relationship with him.  We are happy to make this clear and apologise to Ms Paul for any upset caused.

Papers apologise, pay damages for terrorism and gangster claims

MailOnline, 4 May 2012:

Algerian man wrongly accused of providing French hideout for British Al Qaeda terrorists

Metro and other publishers yesterday told the High Court they had agreed to pay substantial damages to an Algerian man for wrongly reporting that he offered a safe house in France to British Al Qaeda terrorists.

Associated Newspapers, the publisher of MailOnline and Metro, The Telegraph Media Group, MGN, the publisher of the Daily Mirror, and the publisher of the Daily Express apologised in the High Court to Farid Boukemiche, 40.

Some reports said he was on trial in France in January 2011 for associating with a known terrorist organisation and for financing terrorism.

Others alleged he was a ‘gangster’ accused of carrying out robberies or had admitted to robbery.

The High Court heard the articles had been withdrawn from the newspapers’ websites, that they had accepted that the allegations were untrue and they had apologised to Mr Boukemiche.

Daily Mirror, 4 May 2012:

Farid Boukemiche

In court yesterday we and other newspapers apologised to Farid Boukemiche. In an article provided to us by a freelance journalist which was published on 4 January 2011 we wrongly said that he was on trial in France accused of funding terrorism. Although he had been arrested in France in 2005 he was not on trial as all charges against him had been withdrawn in 2008. We further accepted that he was not a gangster nor that he had offered a "safe house" in France to British terrorists. We have paid him damages and costs.

Daily Telegraph, 3 May 2012:

Farid Boukemiche

Mr Farid Boukemiche yesterday accepted an apology and damages over reports in The Telegraph (Jan 3 and 4 2011) and other newspapers.

The court was told that reporting was based on information supplied by a freelance journalist and incorrectly suggested that Mr Boukemiche was on trial in France in January 2011 for associating with a known terrorist organisation; for financing terrorism; offering a “safe house” in France to British terrorists from Al Qaeda networks and that he was a “gangster” who was accused of carrying out robberies (including one allegation of armed robbery) and/or had admitted to robbery.

Mr Jonathen Scherbel-Ball, representing the newspapers, told the court that the publications acknowledged that the information was untrue and apologised for the distress caused. 

Metro, 4 May 2012:

Correction - Farid Boukemiche

Metro and other publishers yesterday told the High Court they had agreed to pay substantial damages to an Algerian man for wrongly reporting that he offered a safe house in France to British Al Qaeda terrorists.

Associated Newspapers, the publisher of MailOnline and Metro, The Telegraph Media Group, MGN, the publisher of the Daily Mirror, and the publisher of the Daily Express apologised in the High Court to Farid Boukemiche, 40.

Some reports said he was on trial in France in January 2011 for associating with a known terrorist organisation and for financing terrorism.

Others alleged he was a ‘gangster’ accused of carrying out robberies or had admitted to robbery.

The court heard the articles had been withdrawn from the newspapers’ websites, that they had accepted that the allegations were untrue and they had apologised to Mr Boukemiche.

Did a nude motorbike passenger really receive a warning from Romanian police?

On the news pages of the Mirror website, the banner says:

On 24 April, under this banner, the Mirror published this story:

The article by 'agency staff' says:

They're the kind of bumpers that could be a serious safety hazard for other pop-eyed road users.

But when this nude pillion passenger was stopped by traffic police in Constanta, Romania, the only thing she was pinched for was for not wearing a helmet.

These pictures - taken by other motorists clearly impressed by her boot-y - were taken after she obeyed the police warning and put her crash-hat back on.

And her ample bodywork - now to be found on Facebook - could teach any motorist a thing or two about dangerous curves.

"The officer was a traffic cop and the only traffic offence she'd committed was in not wearing a helmet," explained one witness to Romanian media today.

"So he gave her a warning and a ticket and told her and her companion to ride on," they added.

The same story with the same quotes was repeated by the Metro the day after.

The Mirror's article comes with two photos of the woman on the motorbike, suitably pixelated.

However, as revealed by BildBlog, these photos were posted online on 31 October 2007 (NSFW) by someone who, ahem, clearly had a fondness for sharing (and, possibly, taking) photos of women who are naked in public.

It also appears that most of the cars in the photographs carry licence plates from the Czech Republic, which suggests the photos might not have been taken in Romania at all.

It's not clear where the quote from the anonymous 'witness' came from.

If this incident happened - and that seems doubtful given the origin of the photos - it must have happened over four-and-a-half years ago.

That's 'real news'. In 'real time'. 

(Hat-tip to Petra O)

Mirror apologises to model for serial killer photo error

On Saturday, the Daily Mirror used - without permission - an image of the model Morgana in its 'Women Who Kill' pull-out, to illustrate the story of Vera Renczi.

Today, the paper has apologised:

APOLOGY to Patricia Belda Martinez.

WITH Saturday's Daily Mirror we distributed a supplement entitled 'Women who Kill' which we trailed on the front page of the newspaper with a picture of the front page of the supplement.

One of the women whose story featured in the supplement was Vera Renczi who lived in the former Yugoslavia between 1903 and 1939 and who killed 35 men. Unfortunately due to an error the picture we used, both inside and on the front page of the supplement, was not of Vera Renczi but of Patricia Belda Martinez, who is otherwise known as Morgana and who is a fashion model. The picture we used belongs to Ms Martinez.

We apologise unreservedly to Ms Martinez for our error in wrongly using her picture in the supplement which she, of course, has no connection with and for the considerable embarrassment caused to her by our actions.

UPDATE: Morgana's own blogpost on this is here.

Mirror uses model's image to illustrate serial killer story

Yesterday - the day before Mother's Day - the Daily Mirror came with a free 'Women Who Kill' pull-out. A 'Mirror special on women with no mercy'. It was trailed on the front page:

But which 'female with no mercy' is that in the bottom row, to the right of Myra Hindley? (apologies for image quality)

In the actual pull-out, she appears on the centre pages, under the headline:

35 male bodies all in labelled coffins in her wine cellar, and in the 12th, her son

The photo on the front page is used again inside (image from Patricia Belda Martinez):

The text is about Vera Renczi. But the woman in the picture is not Renczi, or indeed any other murderer.

Instead, it's a model called Morgana, who tweeted:

As Aaron Jacob Jones points out, the image used by the Mirror has had Morgana's copyright cropped off the bottom.

If you search Google Images for 'Vera Renczi' the first result you get is from the Killers Without Conscience website, which used Morgana's image - with the copyright cropped - on a tale about Renczi in September last year.

Was that the extent of the Mirror's research? Didn't they think the image was suspiciously high-quality given Renczi was - apparently - born in 1903?

Morgana added:

you would think newspapers would know better before printing a double page spread with a pic they don't own.

(Hat-tips to Patricia/Morgana, Aaron, Matt and benjymous)

Drake/Leon Best

In an article in the 'sport' section of MailOnline, a headline claims:

Rik Sharma reports:

not many people will have harboured the desire to appear identical to Newcastle United footballer Leon Best.

Nothing against Best of course, but let's be honest, he's not what you would call a household name - although if he continues to score goals like his winner against QPR on Saturday, maybe that will change.

But this girl not only wants to look like Best, her 'favourite soccer player eva', but she'll show you how to as well. Just in case, you know, you ever wanted to.

Using a variety of cosmetics like hair lotion, eyeshadow and eyeliner, she talks you through her creepy transformation from a regular looking girl through to a carbon copy of the striker.

'Add a silver necklace if you wish,' she says. 'And then the transformation is complete.'

The Mail has embedded the video from YouTube at the end. What it hasn't done, however, is read any of the comments under it (or, it seems, any of the comments under its own article). The vast majority are pointing out this isn't really about Leon Best at all. This version of the video is a spoof.

The 'girl' in question is Promise Phan, who has posted lots of videos on YouTube of her using make-up to make herself look like other people - Angelina Jolie, Justin Bieber and Kim Kardashian among them.

Leon Best would certainly seem an unlikely addition to that list. Indeed, what Promise Phan was actually doing was transforming into a rapper called Drake.

Sharma would also have known this if he had read an article (about the 'real' video) which appeared only six days before on...MailOnline:

If Sharma hadn't read the Mail, it is possible he had read Mirror Football's 3pm Extra, which highlighted the video an hour or so before his article was published. It appears the Mirror hadn't realised it was a joke, either.

There is now a link to a second clip embedded in the video, in which someone pretending to be Best speaks to someone pretending to be a journalist about the coverage:

All because you couldn't spare some common sense to do a background check on where this video had come from.

What's wrong with this picture?

An apology from the Daily Mail, published today:

A picture published on January 4 which was captioned as showing convicted murderer David Norris at Deansfield Primary School in fact showed another young boy of the same name. While the picture was published in good faith, neither the individuals pictured nor the school had any connection with the events reported and we apologise for any distress caused.

An apology from the Daily Mirror (spotted by Regret the Error on 16 January):

On Friday 30 December 2011, as part of an article concerning a drugs test investigation at Hull FC, we published a picture of a man we said was Ben Cooper who has been suspended for his role in the affair.

In fact the picture was of Stuart Donlan, the assistant coach of Castleford Tigers, who has never been involved in any way with any drugs testing incident. The photo was supplied by an agency. We offer Stuart Donlan, his family and friends our sincere apologies.

The rumour mill

The Leveson Inquiry, 9 January 2012. Robert Jay QC questions Sun editor Dominic Mohan:

Q. Wasn't the true position something along these lines: that there were rumours going around in the press, which you well knew about, which were suggesting that phone hacking was occurring on a fairly systematic basis in the Mirror's titles?  Is that right or not?

A.  There were rumours in the industry.  There's always rumours in the industry about various methods, but this wasn't based upon any evidence at all.  It was just the Fleet Street rumour mill.

...

Q.  Did those rumours encompass the Sun, for whom of course you were working in 2002?

A.  I can't remember.  It was a very long time ago, clearly. I can't remember the specifics of the rumours.

The Leveson Inquiry, 20 December 2011. Robert Jay QC questions former Mirror editor Piers Morgan:

Q.  Do you remember an interview in which you said: "As for Clive Goodman, I feel a lot of sympathy for a man who has been the convenient fall guy for an investigative practice that everyone knows was going on at almost every paper in Fleet Street for years."

A.  Yes.

Q.  Why did you say that?

A.  Well, that was the rumour mill at the time.  I mean, it was exploding around Fleet Street...I was hearing these rumours like everybody else.

...

Q.  Did the rumour mill you're referring to embrace your newspaper as being amongst the perpetrators?

A.  Not that I remember, no.

Sorry we said you won the lottery

This apology was published by the Daily Mirror last week, and spotted by Regret the Error:

On December 6 under the headline Xmas dinner Is On £1m Lotto Win Coach, we wrongly reported that Mr Paul Trainor (right) had won a £1million Lottery prize. In fact the prize was won by another person.

Mr Trainor does not work at the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust, nor did he buy a turkey-dinner for work colleagues or say the he was going to buy a new car. We are happy to correct the position and apologise to Mr Trainor for any embarrassment or confusion caused as a result.

'A bit cheeky'

In the wake of Jeremy Clarkson's comments about strikers on The One Show, the Mirror asked:

'No' said Mirror columnist Tony Parsons. The 'yes' argument was outlined by Dave Gorman. But Gorman was a little surprised to see his remarks in the paper:

Gorman elaborated on his blog:

I was surprised because I hadn't written anything for the Mirror....If the words are familiar to you, that'll be because you read my last blog.

As did someone at The Mirror. Who then cut and pasted it into the paper. Odd.

Apparently someone on the Radio 2 breakfast show was talking about how I'd written a piece for The Mirror on the whole Clarkson thing too. I don't imagine many of those who read it thought that it wasn't written specifically for the paper.

Which is a bit cheeky of them to say the least.

(Hat-tip to Laura)

Today's corrections

The Sun has published the following correction on page two of today's paper:

We reported on October 18 that 'more than 40 per cent' of all knife crime involves juveniles. In fact, this was an estimate by local police for the London borough of Enfield. The most recent Ministry of Justice figures show the proportion is just under 20 per cent in England and Wales.

This comes after Full Fact looked into the original article and complained to the PCC that the figures were inaccurate. They say:

The correction - within a month of the original article - is welcome, even if it does come after the claim was used by elected representatives when pressing particular policies from the Government.

It highlights how important it is for newspapers to take as much care as possible not to publish inaccurate figures, particularly on crucial matters of policy.

The Mirror has also published a correction today thanks to an investigation by Full Fact:

In our article “Cheating up 30% in 3yrs” we stated the figure for benefit fraud had reached £22billion a year. In fact this figure is an estimate for the total of all fraud and error, and includes mistakes made by the Government and claimants, and fraud which is unrelated to benefits.

Today's Mail corrections are:

Two commentary articles about psychic Sally Morgan in September stated that it is 'illegal in this country to claim to be a medium'. It has been pointed out to us that mediums are in fact legal in this country, although like other businesses they are subject to  consumer protection legislation.

*

In our coverage of Joe Frazier's death on Wednesday, we said that Muhammad Ali had had only one  comeback fight before facing Frazier in 1971. He had in fact fought twice before that bout, facing both Jerry Quarry, as we stated, and Oscar Bonavena.

Earlier this week, the the Mirror published this apology and correction:

On August 3 this year the Daily Mirror published an article regarding the death of Miss Catherine Zaks, aged 21, in Krakow, Poland.

The article contained claims that Miss Zaks, from Robertsbridge, East Sussex, abused drugs and had engaged in casual sex following the break-up of a long-term relationship.

Miss Zaks’ parents have pointed out that these claims are entirely false and that their daughter was much loved, and of good character.

We are happy to set the record straight and apologise for any distress caused.