Two BBC1 daytime news programmes breached broadcasting rules by playing the 999 call of a murder victim moments before she was shot dead.
Media regulator Ofcom said the BBC was wrong to play excerpts of Lucy Lee’s 999 call telling the emergency services that John Lowe had just shot her mother and she was running for her life.
The BBC admitted to Ofcom that the phone call “should not have been used in the headlines of the two bulletins” and “there should have been detailed and considered warning of the inclusion of material in the bodies of the bulletin”.
Ofcom, in its ruling published on Monday, said the use of the call was not justified by the context at a time when many children would have been watching with “the clear potential to disturb viewers”.
It said the BBC was wrong to include the call in the programme headlines and had failed to give enough warning about the content of the call later in the two bulletins.
The 999 call was broadcast on BBC1 on 29 October last year, following the conclusion of the murder trial of John Lowe, found guilty of murdering his partner Christine Lee and her daughter Lucy Lee, at his puppy breeding farm in Surrey.
Both the lunchtime and teatime bulletins featured Lucy Lee’s 999 call in which she said: “My mother’s just been shot … I’m running for my life … he’s just shot my mum, John Lowe ... I don’t know if he’s going to shoot me.”
The BBC told Ofcom it was a “disturbing recording”, but was in its view “integral to understanding the events of that day and the case against Lowe”. It said the call was a “crucial element in the day’s tragic events”.
However, it said the extracts should not have been used in the headlines of the bulletins before there was an opportunity for the reporter or presenter to give “more detailed context”.
It said editorial managers had reminded programme teams about the “sensitivities involved and the need for the provision of proper context and warning”.
Ofcom, which received two complaints, said the broadcasts breached rules on protecting children from unsuitable material and the need for potentially offensive material to be justified by the context.”
The regulator said: “Given that the call represented the last traumatic moments of Ms Lee’s life before her murder, it had the clear potential to disturb viewers.”
Broadcast during the half-term holiday, Ofcom added: “This was particular true with regard to children.”
An Ofcom spokesperson said: “Following a careful investigation, Ofcom found BBC News breached broadcasting rules in a report on the ‘puppy farm murders’ trial.
“The report included a recording a highly distressing 999 call, made by one of the murder victims, which was aired before the watershed and without a warning to viewers. We also ruled the offence caused by this recording was not justified by the context it was presented in.”
