Violent nurse Kevin McCartney Demands An Apology

Among the many things keeping me too busy to blog of late have been a couple of complaints which came my way through Deadline Press & Picture Agency.

It’s a fact of life in journalism that mistakes happen. Reporters deal with complex and emotive subjects and have to crunch them down into short formats for readers/viewers/listeners – all against the clock. That’s not an excuse. When errors happen they should be put right quickly and fairly.

Ideally reporters would be infallible and never drop clangers at all. However we accept that To Err is Human. As long as the errs are occasional. I would hope that innocents who have been maligned, inconvenienced, had their reputation tarnished or been put through an emotional wringer by mistakes or fabrications should expect prompt apologies or clarifications.

I put particular emphasis on the term innocents. Because recent experience leaves me of the opinion that the complaints process has become something of a chancer’s charter.

Last week I had the joy of dealing with the Press Complaints Commission regarding a complaint from Mr Kevin McCartney. This bloke was a nurse who twice battered his girlfriend. In one case, after she poured his booze down the drain, he dragged her through their home by her hair, screaming: “I’m going to kill you.”

During the assualt McCartney’s partner and her daughter were so terrified they had to barricade themselves in the bathroom. Apparently he was “going through a difficult time” when he gave his girlfriend a kicking and is now “extremely remorseful”.

Remorse aside, McCartney landed in court – and later at a hearing of the Nursing and Midwifery Council, who had to decide whether he was competent to keep practising. The nursing tribunal imposed a five-year caution order on the shamed nurse.

In reporting the nursing hearing, a Deadline reporter misheard the details of McCartney’s earlier court punishement, which was a 16 week sentence, suspended for two years. It’s a crucial point – because the journalist mistakenly reported that McCartney was jailed for 16 weeks. In fact, he never spent any time in prison.

McCartney obviously felt his reputation (or what was left of it) had been tarnished by the suggestion he was banged up. So it was his right to seek redressfrom the three papers – all of whom printed immediately clarifications.

If it was me in that situation, I might also want everyone to know that I wasn’t actually jailed. So, I’d seek my clarification and then quitely let the issue drop.

Not McCartney, however. Oh no, he has pressed further, telling the PCC: “I find it disappointing and disturbing that these agencies are permitted to produce and circulate reports that are factually inaccurate, incorrect and speculative without anyone being held accountable.”

Maybe by judgement is skewed, but I’m weighing up which of these scenarios is most disappointing and disturbing:

1 – Convicted domestic abuser allowed to continue working as a nurse, albeit under supervision.

2 – Genuine error in report of legal proceedings swiftly corrected by all publications involved.

Having to write a detailed response for the PCC in reply to McCartney’s “concerns”, was almost enought to drive me to drink.

The good news is that, despite my ordeal, I was able to resist any urges to beat my wife.