Anonymity in Sexual Offence Cases: A Legal Perspective

The question relates to Anonymity, this is when a person is unknown and unacknowledged, so others cannot know their identity. In the old law in the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1976 it stated that a victim and defendant of an alleged sexual offence were both granted anonymity. So, with regarding to the media it destined that the victims and defendants of rape and other sexual offences could not be identified or published in the media, including photos or any other details that could lead to their identification. However, the anonymity protection for defendants was removed by the Criminal Justice Act 1988 S.158(5) and remains the same today, with much debate due to unfairness seen as victims still hold their lifelong anonymity protection.

This can be seen in the ‘Ian Watkins case’ and the indirect identification of his child victims. The mother who was also convicted who allowed Watkins to sexually assault her 12-month old daughter was not named. This was for the purpose to protect the child’s identity, not to protect the mothers. If the mother was named it is likely that it would be easy to identify the child through the mother’s identity, as they may have the same surname. When looking at this case it could be argued it would be easier if both defendant and victim were granted anonymity and then there is even less chance of the victim becoming known and there wouldn’t be need for the judge to make exceptions to defendants like in this