PARIS - Two photographers who took pictures of Diana, Princess of Wales, before and after her fatal car accident in Paris in 1997 were yesterday formally accused of "invading the intimacy of private lives".
This brings to three the number of photographers, present that night, who have been placed under judicial investigation under France's stringent privacy laws.
The case - quite separate from the manslaughter proceeding brought against nine photographers and a dispatch rider and dropped in 1999 - looks likely to cause a heated row about press freedom in France.
Serge Benhamou and Laszlo Veres were placed under investigation yesterday - one stop short of a charge - for taking pictures of Diana, and her companion, Dodi El Fayed in their Mercedes limousine before and after the fatal crash in the first minutes of 31 August 1997.
Both were among the group of photographers previously cleared of manslaughter. They are now accused of photographing the occupants of the Mercedes after it left the Ritz hotel and then taking pictures of the dead and dying a few minutes later.
The belated proceedings arise from a private case brought by Dodi's father, the Harrod's owner, Mohammed El Fayed. At first French judicial authorities refused to persue his complaint that the photographers had broken the French law which guarantees the privacy of public figures.
A court decided last October that Mr Fayed was right and that legal action should be considered.
French courts have previously ruled that pictures taken of people inside a car infringe their privacy. In this case, however, the pictures taken that night have never been published.
The French "people" magazine Paris Match and photo agencies have complained that the case is taking French law into dangerously, restrictive new ground.
Virginie Bardet, lawyer for the two photographers who were formally accused yesterday, said: "I consider that there was no offence. My clients were simply doing their work covering public figures."
Another photographer, Jacques Langevin, was placed under investigation last month. Several others of the original ten are expected to be called before an examining magistrate in the next few days.
- INDEPENDENT
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