Confusion over 'landmark' satellite football case
The Premier League has announced it will resume its foreign satellite football prosecutions in the magistrates courts after a 'landmark' High Court appeal appeared to have missed its deadline.
The trade has been waiting for Portsmouth licensee Karen Murphy to appeal her conviction for showing foreign satellite football in her Red, White and Blue pub in Southsea.
Mr Dixon has missed his deadline we can only presume there will be no appeal and will be looking to resume our prosecutions in the Magistrates CourtRay Hoskin of MPS.
The trade has viewed this case as a possible 'landmark' to finally clear up the confusion surrounding foreign satellite screenings.
Ray Hoskin of Media Protection Services, the company which took Murphy to court on behalf of the Premier League, said today that his solicitors were yet to receive any notice of appeal from Murphy's solicitor Paul Dixon.
Hoskin exclusively told the Morning Advertiser: "Mr Dixon has missed his deadline we can only presume there will be no appeal and will be looking to resume our prosecutions in the Magistrates Court.
"Over the last two to three years he has held out that the High Court would solve this matter in his client's favour.
"Now he has had every opportunity to lodge papers and he has failed to do so."
However, Paul Dixon, of Molesworth, Bright Clegg, also speaking exclusively to the MA said as far as he was concerned Karen Murphy would still be having her day in court.
He said: "As much as the FAPL might hope that Karen Murphy's appeal will not proceed so that they can resume their relentless pursuit of hard working publicans, the simple fact of the matter is that vital paperwork from Portsmouth Crown which triggers the High Court appeal procedure has had to be returned to Portsmouth for correction.
"The appeal procedure only commences when HHJ Pearson at Portsmouth Crown Court is happy with the papers."
Premier League spokesman Dan Johnson said: "It is a matter of record that Mr Dixon has missed the deadline for submitting Murphy's appeal to the High Court, as to why he has failed to do this you would have to ask him.
"However, we find it more than a little surprising given his previous stance on this matter after Murphy lost both at Magistrates and Crown Court level, indeed we were looking forward to being able to lay this issue to rest once and for all.
"All we can say is that the all the courts that have ruled on this state that the law is clear; screening live Barclays Premier League matches via a foreign satellite system in this country is against the law. As such we will continue to take the appropriate action against licensees who continue to flout the law as well as pursuing the suppliers of these illegal systems."
