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Premier League manager caught 'visiting prostitutes in a brothel' | Mail Online A married Premier League football manager has been caught visiting a brothel - but the British Press cannot reveal his identity on human rights grounds. The soccer boss, a family man with children, was witnessed entering and leaving the building on a shabby industrial estate where Thai prostitutes offer sex for £130 an hour. He is said to have freely admitted that he knew it was a brothel. Within hours of the story breaking in the S*n, football fans' websites were flooded with speculation about his identity. Many contributors accurately named him and his club. Yet despite this placing of his name in the public domain in a way easily accessible to millions, newspapers are effectively barred from publishing it because of a creeping law of privacy laid down by judges over the past five years. MPs and lawyers protested yesterday that the rules of privacy have become an intolerable burden on freedom of speech and are winning Britain an international reputation for censorship and suppression of information. It has reached the point where the wealthy from abroad are indulging in 'privacy shopping' to shield them from reporting in their own countries. This month golfer Tiger Woods secured an injunction in London to prevent publication of certain photographs which were not even known to exist. Yesterday, the S*n published a story telling how the manager spent more than an hour in the brothel, which advertises itself as a massage parlour. He arrived dressed in training clothes featuring his club logo. Confronted by reporters outside the building and asked if he knew it was a brothel, he said: 'Yes.' It was said to be his second trip there following an hour-long visit in October. But if the S*n or any other newspaper published his name, it could face the threat of a hugely expensive privacy action in the courts. This is despite the majority of the public finding the manager's indulgence in vice immoral and offensive. In addition, a number of deep public interest concerns are raised by the incident. By visiting the brothel, he could have encouraged a number of crimes or even have committed one himself. Brothels are in some cases suspected of involvement in selling sex with under-age girls and human trafficking. Running a brothel remains a serious crime and the S*n suggested that the manager could have opened up his club to the risk of blackmail. MPs and lawyers questioned why the law is now censoring true information before it can reach the public. Tory MP Phil Davies, a member of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, which is running an inquiry into privacy law, said: 'The greatest thing is freedom of speech. My starting point is that the press must be free to publish. We now have privacy law, and privacy is the new libel. The difference is that under privacy law you may not publish things that are true. My view is that if you are in the public eye, then, like it or not, you are fair game. I am not particularly judgmental about sex, but the papers have a right to publish.' Lawyer Mark Stephens said: 'We have gone far too far with our privacy laws. There was a concern that the media was becoming more aggressive in its reporting. That has now been swung back, and the law is now being used by the rich and powerful to stifle legitimate reporting.' Mr Stephens added: 'If one looks back in history at the infamous behaviour of David Mellor, that could not now be reported because of privacy laws. We need to redress the balance. Our courts are now being held in ill-repute.' ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Who do you reckon it is?