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[TonyGosling]

Would you buy a used coroner report from this man?

New Diana coroner thwarted in media ban
By Caroline Davies

Last Updated: 2:18am BST 14/06/2007
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/14/ndiana114.xml

The new coroner for the inquest into the death of Diana, Princess of Wales yesterday pledged an "open, fair and transparent" inquiry - then immediately attempted to gag the press.

Only minutes into his first public pre-inquest hearing, Lord Justice Scott-Baker imposed a blanket ban on journalists reporting details of any evidence that could be put before the jury.

Only after lawyers for Mohamed Fayed, whose son Dodi also died in the 1997 car accident, the Ritz Hotel and the family of the French chauffeur Henri Paul protested did Lord Scott-Baker set the order aside - though he indicated it could be reintroduced on an "ad hoc" basis.

Michael Mansfield, QC, for Mr Fayed, said any reporting restrictions would prevent public debate of evidence already published in Lord Stevens's Operation Paget report.

It was "closing the stable door after the horse has bolted," said Richard Keen, QC, for the family of Mr Paul, who was driving the car which crashed in Paris.

Lord Scott-Baker ruled that the inquests into the deaths of the princess and Dodi Fayed would begin on Oct 2, would be held in Court 73 at the Royal Courts of Justice, in London, and should last "an absolute maximum of six months".

And he fired a warning shot to lawyers over costs, which will be borne by the taxpayer. Urging "tight discipline", he said: "The longer the inquests last the greater these costs will be. It is the duty of all of us to keep them within reasonable bounds."

Potential jurors will be asked questions on the first day to ensure that nothing disqualifies them from sitting on the case.

Lord Scott-Baker will also now have to read documents submitted by the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) to Operation Paget - a job Robin Tam, QC, for the SIS said would take him about a week, and would not be "an entertaining read".

The coroner must read the documents to decide whether they can be disclosed to Mr Fayed's lawyers. Mr Tam said there was nothing in them that was relevant to the inquest and therefore they should not be disclosed.

Lawyers for Mr Fayed had argued that it would be impossible to prevent potential jurors from being exposed to the "plethora of material" - such as books, television documentaries and press reports - coinciding with the 10th anniversary of the princess's death on Aug 31.

Any reporting ban would be "artificial in the middle of the turmoil," said Mr Mansfield. Some may have already read Lord Stevens's report, they said, though Lord Scott-Baker drily observed: "I suspect the answer in most cases might be no."

Mr Fayed wants the inquest to examine all the allegations and conspiracy theories surrounding the deaths, including his claims that the couple were murdered by the "Establishment" in a secret service plot masterminded by Prince Philip, that the princess was pregnant and her body illegally embalmed to cover up that fact, and that she had agreed to marry Dodi Fayed.

Edmund Lawson, QC, representing the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said that if the inquest was to re-examine all the allegations put forward by Mr Fayed, then he was "extremely pessimistic" about the six-month time-scale.

"It will, in effect, be a re-investigation of just about everything that was investigated by Paget," he said. Operation Paget took Lord Stevens, a former Metropolitan Police commissioner, three years to complete.