hiros.hu also lost in the second instance in the press correction lawsuit initiated by the representative from Jobbik – KecsUP

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Although the editors of hiros.hu and Kecskemét Televízíós Nonprofit Kft. appealed in vain in the press correction lawsuit initiated by János Bencze, Member of Parliament from Jobbik, the Szeged Jury found this to be groundless and upheld the first-instance verdict of the Kecskemét Court a few days ago. hiros.hu published the corrective notice on Wednesday, April 24.

We have written about the case several times, but now we will only briefly mention it.

• It started when parliamentarian János Bencze (Jobbik-Conservatives) was contacted by many people, according to his claim, that the traffic authority had called in their cars for an extraordinary technical inspection, and motorists claimed that on many documents the Kecskemét City Police was listed as the whistleblower, because in their opinion the car does not meet the conditions of traffic.
• On December 5, the Member of Parliament wrote to the relevant department of the government office and the head of the Kecskemét City Police, dr. To Zsolt the Germanand asked, among other things, which law the City Police staff act on when they take photos of vehicles they consider suspicious and what kind of technical preparation or training makes them competent to be able to judge irregularities.
• Then on December 13 last year, he also spoke about the topic in the Parliament. “The city of Kecskemét entered the history of automobiles in such a way that we cannot define it in any other way than that perhaps it became the Mecca of car chases” – this is how he began his speech. He complained that these cars were considered illegal on the basis of assumptions and photos taken while parked, proceedings were initiated and that official administrative burdens were unreasonably imposed on several vehicle owners, because in fact no illegal modifications were made to their cars, and no traffic violations were committed. no violation.
• Dr. Zsolt Német then held a press conference more than a week later, on December 21, at the beginning of which a video recording of the plaintiff’s parliamentary speech was shown (in one of our previous articles, we ourselves spoke to an affected car owner and the representative himself, the City Police did not wanted to make a statement and we were not even invited to the press conference).
• hiros.hu reported on the press conference the same day with the following title: “JOBBIK member of parliament János Bencze wanted to protect the illegal drivers”and in the lead (introduction) it was written: “In his speech on December 13, after the agenda, János Bencze, member of parliament, also complained about the inspection of illegally equipped vehicles and sending them for a traffic inspection test. JOBBIK’s father-in-law only received complaints from motorists presumably rallying on the roads of Kecskemét at night, he did not wait for information from the city police.”

According to the interpretation of hiros.hu, János Bencze:
1. sided with the illegally racing drivers
2. complained about the inspection of irregularly converted vehicles and sending them to the traffic authority test
3. spoke out against the Kecskemét town officials based on the complaints of the owners of illegally converted vehicles.

• Due to the three allegations, the representative from Jobbik requested a correction, but hiros.hu did not comply with the request.
• For this, János Bencze filed a lawsuit at the Kecskemét Court of Justice and, as we wrote, he won the press-correction lawsuit at first instance (the first-order defendant was the editorial office of hiros.hu, the second-order was Kecskemét Televízíós Nonprofit Kft.). The legal representative of hiros.hu based the defense on the fact that they only reported on a press conference, the controversial statements were made at the press conference, and the Kecskemét City Police, including the head of the institution dr. They reflect the position of Zsolt Német. According to the judgment of the court, the editors of hiros.hu did not even try to find out the position of János Bencze, did not search for him, did not ask him before the publication of the article, did not provide him with the opportunity to comment. Thus, during the court proceedings, he would have had to prove the veracity of his claims, which János Bencze started the rectification lawsuit against.

KecsUP recently received the decision of the second-instance court, according to which the first-instance defendant hiros.hu and the second-instance defendant Kecskeméti Televíziós Nonprofit Kft. appealed in vain, the Szeged Court of Appeals found this groundless and upheld the first-instance verdict of the Kecskemét Court.

hiros.hu, among other things, defended itself by saying that the content of the coverage is part of the public debate, János Bencze and Zsolt Német “they expressed a different opinion on an issue affecting local public opinion”. This defense is based on a decision of the Constitutional Court, according to which human dignity cannot be violated during a public debate, and freedom of speech enjoys special protection when discussing public affairs.

They also maintained that what was published in the article faithfully contains the opinion of the head of the City Police about János Bencze and what was said at the press conference, and does not reflect their own position.

They did not dispute that they did not contact the politician so that he could refute what was said at the press conference, but this in itself was not considered a circumstance that would establish an obligation to make corrections.

According to the court, examining the article as a whole, “it seems to the reader that it provides factual, summary information” about János Bencze’s speech concerning local public affairs, which “the author qualifies based on what was said at the press conference of the head of the City Police, quoting the latter faithfully. The conclusion can also be drawn from the title and its wording that it was intended to support his opinion reflected in the article with the facts he claimed.. The judging panel agreed with the court regarding the contested passages that “the offending statements are untrue statements of fact, not – even veiled – expressions of opinion. Their reality can be proven.”

The second-instance court pointed out that the representative did not receive an answer to his questions to the head of the City Police before his speech in parliament, so he was not, could not have been aware that the series of measures was aimed at ending illegal speeding competitions and taking action against “rioters”.

The judgment also states that hiros.hu, in fact, using the statement of the head of the City Police at the press conference and faithfully published in the other parts of the article, the representative’s speech “according to his own idea, he made the provably untrue factual statements detailed in the first and second paragraphs of the article”.

The panel pointed out that according to a decision of the Constitutional Court “the press conference can basically be considered an event that the press can report on without the obligation to prove the reality, it is exempted from its general obligation to check the truthfulness of the facts reported, but its exemption from liability is not unconditional. It is a requirement that the journalist convey to the public what was formulated by another person faithfully, clearly indicating the identifiable source of the statements, without his own evaluation, and that the press organization provides an opportunity for refutation before the publication of the press article in order to provide authentic information.. According to the court, hiros.hu fulfilled its obligation to provide reliable and accurate information to the press only with Zsolt Német’s statement, but did not prove the reality of the facts objected to in János Bencze’s claim.

hiros.hu published the corrective notice on Wednesday, April 24. First only in the sidebar:

Then in the leading position:

Pursuant to the decision of the Szeged Jury, the second defendant, i.e. Kecskemét Televízíós Nonprofit Kft., as the publisher of hiros.hu, must pay HUF 15,000 court costs to the plaintiff and HUF 48,000 appeal procedure fees to the state. In the first instance, the court costs to be paid to the plaintiff were nearly HUF 84,000, and the procedural fee was HUF 36,000. So this one article caused HUF 183,000 in expenses for the publisher of hiros.hu.

In writing, we contacted the managing editor-in-chief Polett Kozák and his deputy, János Vandlik, about who will pay the legal costs, whether it is expected that the persons who wrote and published the article, as well as the responsible editor(s), will undertake to compensate the publisher for the damage they have caused. We have not received an answer yet.

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