Northern Ireland

Police criticised over handling of Facebook 'revenge porn' case

Lawyers for a 14-year-old alleged 'revenge porn' victim have criticised the PSNI's handling of the case. Picture by Dominic Lipinski, Press Association
Lawyers for a 14-year-old alleged 'revenge porn' victim have criticised the PSNI's handling of the case. Picture by Dominic Lipinski, Press Association Lawyers for a 14-year-old alleged 'revenge porn' victim have criticised the PSNI's handling of the case. Picture by Dominic Lipinski, Press Association

LAWYERS acting for a 14-year-old girl at the centre of a landmark legal action against Facebook over revenge porn have criticised the PSNI's handling of the case.

Naked photographs of the girl, from Northern Ireland, were allegedly posted on the social media site. Facebook has since agreed to pay compensation to the teenager.

One of the girl's lawyers, Pearse MacDermott from McCann and McCann Solicitors, told the Press Association that police delays in the handling of the case meant officers were unable to prosecute the person who posted the images, which caused a "detrimental effect" to the teenager's mental health.

He added that he hoped the PSNI had learnt from the case and would in future "act with more haste" when dealing with similar ones.

"The police carried out an investigation, but it took a long time. By the time they got around to investigate, whatever device had the photograph on it was gone. They therefore couldn't substantiate who put (the images) up," he said.

The girl's legal team launched High Court proceedings after her photo was allegedly posted on a so-called shame page on Facebook - which has a headquarters in Dublin - several times between November 2014 and January 2016.

On Tuesday, Facebook reached a confidential out-of-court settlement with the victim.