Outright lying in the Daily Express UPDATED AGAIN

Okay, okay - I know I said my next post would be about something other than the Express and the goons in its comments section, but I can't ignore this.

The story is 'Muslim juror 'wore MP3 player' under hijab'. Can't argue with the tabloids for running with this story. It's a breathtaking example of contempt of court. Although it seems her behaviour is connected more with being an immature idiot than being a Muslim.

What you can argue with is bald faced lying. Pun definitely intended. Shut up. Here's the picture and caption used to illustrate the story:



First of all, the veil in the picture is not a hijab. *Clarification - the veil in the picture is a form of hijab - but not what people commonly refer to when they use the term 'hijab'. My bad.* Secondly, the juror did not wear a full faced veil at all. Again, here's another right wing paper's version of the story, the Mail's 'Facing jail, juror whose hijab hid an MP3 player'. Look at the picture:



See the hijab? See the juror's face?

I really don't know how the paper would try to get out of this one, but you can bet your arse it will try, and probably succeed. Only thing I can think of is that it says this:

The woman, who was wearing a hijab, a figure-hugging black-and-white dress and jeans, was then led into court to be told the decision.

But given it actually shows a picture of a niqab and explicitly states that the juror wore a veil like the full-faced one in the picture, it can't use the old 'Withdrawn!' technique. I'm guessing the defence will be that it's a mistake. Which is bollocks, frankly. This is clearly an attempt to slot this story into the paper's campaign to ban the niqab, with shameless, shameless lying.

See it work on the goons in the comments. Except me, obviously.

*UPDATE* Managed to get to the shop to have a look at the paper edition, and the niqab picture isn't there. That means it's more likely to be a mistake, but since I first posted on the comments section about it hours ago and someone must have approved the comment, and the picture is still there, I'm not so sure. Just about to fire off a comment to the online editor, so we'll see what happens.

*ANOTHER UPDATE* Didn't hear a dickie bird from the online editor and the picture's still there as of 11pm on 10 July. There's been a bit of a tear up in the comments if you're interested. Nothing I can't handle. You'll have to wade through nastiness like 'Get these muslim slags out of my country!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!', but you might be interested.

*YET ANOTHER UPDATE* Got a reply from the online editor yesterday but missed it. Apparently, the editorial staff are 'looking into removing it'. Whether that's out of the kindness of their hearts or because I've banged on about it over and over again in the comments we'll never know. Photo and caption are still there though, as of 12pm on 12 July. The 'debate' with the cavalcade of screaming goons goes on.

Funny how I get an assurance that the photo might be removed after the link from the front page disappeared too.

*PROBABLY THE FINAL UPDATE* Picture and caption still there as of 10pm on 12 July. 'Debate' seems to have finished now, but I feel a bit like I just cracked a nut with a steamroller. Still, it was a frothing, BNP supporting bigot of a nut, so fuck it.

*DEFINITELY THE FINAL UPDATE* It's now over six months later, and despite assurances that the editorial team would look into removing the lying picture, it's still there.