The husband of X Factor judge Cheryl Fernandez-Versini has accepted undisclosed privacy damages over a magazine article which speculated about their "secret" wedding.
Businessman Jean Bernard Fernandez-Versini, who married the 31-year-old singer - better known as Cheryl Cole - in July, brought proceedings for invasion of privacy and breach of the Data Protection Act 1998 at London's High Court against Bauer Consumer Media Ltd, publisher of Heat magazine.
His solicitor, Callum Galbraith, told Mr Justice Dingemans that the upset and distress caused by the article, which appeared in August, was compounded by the fact that Mr Fernandez-Versini had sought to avoid the media's glare.
The article also contained inaccuracies which the magazine did not put to him in advance of publication.
Mr Galbraith said that the article claimed that Mr Fernandez-Versini's wife had paid for her wedding ring and that her mother was to live with the couple.
Published across four pages, it speculated about what happened prior to and during the wedding, although it acknowledged it had been "secret", and went on to comment about how they would live in the future.
He added that the publishers now accepted that the article amounted to an unjustified intrusion into Mr Fernandez-Versini's private and family life, had apologised and agreed to pay him damages and contribute to his legal costs.
Neither Mr Fernandez-Versini nor his wife were at the hearing.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article