Hi all,
I'm interested in finding out the lawin England about using an image of someoen without their permission. Bit of Background to the question below:

When my son was about 1yr old (2008) we were approached by a photographer at a trade fair I was exhibiting at, to have some photos done. He gave us a voucher for a free photo shoot and a free 7x5 image print, no strings attached. Normally we wouldn't even consider it but as this guy was a fellow exhibitor we thought why not? I explained at the time we couldn't really afford to buy professional photos but he said don't worry he would really like to photograph our son, He isn't going to rip us off right?.

So we had the photo shoot done and this guy rang to tell us he had seen the photos and they were brilliant and can he use one of them as an entry into a competition? We said "maybe" but that we wanted to discuss with him what that would mean and how widely the photo would be seen, once we saw the images. We arranged for him to come to our house to show us the photos.

When he arrived he showed us the photos, which were lovely and the price list which was very expensive so we politely declined saying we would like the 7x5 and would like to think about the others (really liked one of the images and one of the frames but wanted to discuss money privately before ordering anything as it cost a LOT more than we had anticipated spending but really liked it!). He continued to press us, offering to let us pay it over a period, saying its not much money and we didn't have to pay immediately, basically being incredibly pushy and really laying on the hard sell. Eventually with me in tears, my husband asked him to leave in no uncertain terms, and escorted him from our home.

Although very angry and upset at the time, we thought nothing more of it until last week when we ran into this guy at an open day for our sons new nursery. I clocked him and avoided him as I didn't want anything to do with him but he honed in on my husband and followed him until my husband stopped and spoke to him. The photographer proudly told my husband he had used one of the images of our son in an advertising campaign for a charity. We had not signed a model release or ever given him permission to use the image. When I got angry about it he kept using the excuse that it was a charity and we shouldn't mind. He then changed tack to saying that he couldn't contact us despite knowing where my husband works (Trade fair was at the hotel my husband runs and he knew that!) and having both my phone number and my email address which have not changed since. We reminded him we had not given permission to use the photos for anything and how upset I had been at the time, with him pressuring us. At this point the photographer became very apologetic about not understanding I had been that upset and about using the image without our permission and said by way of apology he would send us a disk with all the images on it. Not wishing to create further ructions at our sons new nursery we agreed to this measure as a pacifier with the agreement that we would then subsequently decide if we were happy for him to continue to use the image and let him know once we had the opportunity to think about it.

When we got home I had a look at his website, out of interest and discovered him using our sons image on the home page of his site, without permission. We took a screen shot of it luckily as the next day he had removed it.

We decided to wait until the disk of photos arrived before we decided whether to do anything about it. Today the disk arrived (Hand delivered to the nursery, not our home address which we gave him) along with a verbal message to the nursery manager saying if we sign the model release we can have an album of the other photos he took. 1 photo and a model release form is all that is on the disk he delivered. We then noticed that he had a 2nd website address on the model release form so we had a look and lo and behold if he isn't using 3 images of our son on that website too! The website appears to be new, published after we saw him last week! We have again screen shotted it and saved the web pages complete in case he decides to change them again.

To be honest we had been starting to believe that he really didn't realise how upset I had been and was trying to make amends but now I think he is just lying to cover his back and continue to use the photos without our knowledge.

Where do we stand legally with this? He is ignoring our wishes not to use our sons image. We don't so much want him to stop using the images as not have used them without our permission in the first place!

This has caused significant distress to me as I don't want my sons image all over the place! At least not without me knowing about it. I’m also concerned he may be using the other images without peoples’ permission and he appears to be the official nursery photographer!

Thanks for staying with me this long!

Did you sign ANY sort of release, including allowing him use of the photo in exchange for his free services? I would worry about your situation specifically and not what else he may be doing.

I would contact an Attorney IMMEDIATELY and have a very strong letter written to the photographer. He will either present a signed release or he will have some sort of explanation.

Then you know where to go from there.

If he's used and released it it very well may have been picked up by someone else.

I was asked to look into a matter where someone - and I appreciate this is not your situation - picked up a photo from Facebook and used it in an ad. Took it (by Order) in front of a Judge. Ruled once it was posted it was open to anyone who wanted to use it, permission or not.

Of course, I am talking about the US and a somewhat different situation but if the photographer has posted it, someone else may pick it up.

Talk to an Attorney.

No, didn't sign any sort of release at all, ever. And the fact that he has now sent us a model release form makes me suspicious that he knows he has screwed up. I am primarilly concerned with our situation but I'm very angry he would do this and if what he is doing is wrong I need to inform the nursery. I would want another parent to do the same for me. It certainly won't be my focus if I decide to pursue this to the end. Thank you very much for your advice.

I have been doing some reading and wonder if this is covered by our UK Data Protection Act. Any other experts out there please?

I realize you want to hear from another expert -

I did research and I do understand the UK Data Protection Act. I'm sure someone will come along and explain it to you.

Good luck.