Finland’s Supreme Court has upheld a previous ruling by an appeal court, which fined a Helsinki District Court judge for inadvertently disclosing the names of victims recorded in secret sex tapes.
The appeal court had imposed a fine on the judge in the case for negligent breach of professional secrecy, which the Supreme Court upheld.
The judge’s actions involved the case of former high-profile MTV television personality Axl Smith, who was convicted for secretly recording video of his sex partners without their consent and distributing some of the content, also without their knowledge.
The case had generated a great deal of publicity, so the judge overseeing it had ruled that the identities of the victims should also be withheld when a verdict was handed down. He had therefore drawn up two versions of the verdict: one that was to be sealed and another that would be public.
The court’s press officer had sent the public version of the verdict to about 140 members of the media, however the names of seven victims were included. This allowed reporters to link details in the verdict, such as sexual activity and health information, to the victims’ names.
Judge tried to correct error
The judge in question tried to correct the error as soon as it came to his attention.
The Supreme Court found that the judge had disclosed information that should have remained secret when he approved the public version of the verdict. It also ruled that he was still responsible for the outcome, although he did not distribute the verdict himself.
The Court also found that the judge had been negligent in checking confidentiality notations and that the act could not be seen as insignificant, because it resulted in sensitive information about the victims ending up in the hands of a large group of journalists.
The Court therefore upheld the 25-day fine imposed by the appellate court.
The penalty took into consideration the serious consequences of the act, in addition to the fact that the IT system used to draw up the verdict made it possible to misinterpret the use of notation codes.
In November 2017, an appeal court sentenced Smith to a suspended 14-month prison sentence. He was convicted on 30 counts of voyeurism, four counts of defamation and two counts of disseminating information that violated personal privacy committed against 29 victims.