Media coverage on the Tony Veitch case
Media release
Roundtable on VAW Press Release, 17 April 2009
We note since this release that Dame Susan Devoy revealed she didn't know her testimonial would be used in court being told it was to support Tony Veitch's passport application.
Comment from a Roundtable member
Early
analysis by Sandra
Dickson at Newswire suggested the Dominion Post, who broke the story, were
covering the case very differently from other media outlets. They showed a reluctance to blame Kristin
Dunne-Powell, and treated the alleged (at that point) assault which broke bones
in her back as an inexcusable act of violence.
What
happened next can only be described as a media frenzy, in which the media
repeatedly broke the rules of sub-judice on reporting on a case before the
court. Tony Veitch hired media guru
Glenda Hughes, and a number of stories appeared attacking the credibility of
Kristen Dunne-Powell, particularly in the Sunday papers. Auckland University of Technology academic
Martin Hirst described this as the “rehabilitation
of Tony Veitch”.
There has
been repeated coverage of Tony Veitch’s mental health and suicide attempts –
all of which, according to the media outlets, have been communicated to the
media directly from Mr Veitch’s media advisers themselves. It’s worth listening to the National Radio
programme MediaWatch from 26 April 2009, which raises the issue of the objectivity of
various media outlets.
“The dark
forces” of media outlets targeting a poor unfortunate victim of circumstance?
The case
has polarized Aotearoa New
There is no
doubt that women being assaulted does not usually make headline news in this
way. There is also no doubt that most
men who assault women cannot afford to pay in excess of $150,000 to try and
make the problem go away. Or that a
substantial amount of media coverage has come directly from Mr Veitch and the
PR people he has hired to tell his side of the story.
Russell Brown at Hard News
explained why we should not forget the seriousness of the assault - when Mr
Veitch was alleging he was the victim.
Feminist bloggers the
Hand Mirror suggested several “must read” articles, all of which agreed
with this analysis.
One final
comment on the media coverage. The
outcome of this case – that Mr Veitch pleaded guilty to the most serious
assault he was charged with so that the Crown would drop the other five charges
ranging over the previous four years does not make this a one-off event. We don’t know if it was a one-off event,
because we will never hear that judged in court. We do know that the Police
statement after the court case stated:
Kristin
Dunne-Powell's Victim Impact Statement, Dominion Post, 17
April 2009
Womens
Refuge: Veitch plea step in right direction, NZPA, 16 April 2009