Sky News has been forced to apologise to the woman raped by footballer Ched Evans after inadvertently displaying a Twitter feed that named her.
The Sheffield United footballer was convicted of rape and sentenced to five years in jail at Caernarfon Crown Court last week. His sentence caused outrage on Twitter at the weekend, with fans of the 23-year-old leaping to his defence, some going so far as to name the victim.
And rather ironically, in its coverage of the Twitter scandal, Sky News accidentally published the 19-year-old victim's name last night.
In a statement, the broadcaster said that it would "like to apologise to the victim and her family for any distress caused."
But the statement insisted that minimal damage was done, adding that "if watching in real-time viewers would not have noticed."
After the victim was named on Twitter her mother said: "Putting her name on Twitter is just another horrendous ordeal for her and we have been assured the police are going to come down like a ton of bricks on these people."
Rape victims are granted anonymity under the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act in 1976. Police warned tweeters who named the victim that "offenders will be brought to justice."
Evans' teammate Connor Brown called the 19-year-old a "slag" and "money-grabbing little tramp." He has since been suspended from Sheffield United.