Gail Sheridan has instructed her solicitors to pursue a judicial review of the decision by broadcasting regulator OFCOM yesterday, which rejected complaints lodged by Mrs Sheridan and her husband Tommy Sheridan against the BBC documentary "The Rise and Lies of Tommy Sheridan", broadcast after his conviction on perjury charges.

The regulator also rejected a separate complaint by Mrs Sheridan centred around the broadcast of her interview by Lothian and Borders police, itself the subject of separate inquiries to establish the source of the leak.

Mrs Sheridan says there was no public interest to justify broadcasting her interview, during which Lothian and Borders police suggested she had been trained in interrogation techniques by the Provisional IRA.

Charges against Mrs Sheridan were dropped by the Crown and she was not convicted of any offence.

"I am bemused, saddened and angered by the Ofcom decision to reject my complaint," she said.

"The big and powerful BBC appear free to do what they want with material illegally obtained from either the Lothian and Borders police or the Scottish Crown Office. They used that private and illegally obtained material concerning my six hour grilling by the police without my consent or even consultation. There was no 'public interest' defence for such a breach of my privacy and one wonders what Data Protection laws are really worth when such blatant abuses can occur without any chastisement or punishment.

"I was guilty of no crime. Every single charge against me was dropped without a shred of evidence being presented against me. Yet a police interview recording was then illegally passed to the BBC and broadcast despite never being shown in court. I believe my personal privacy was abused and my right to Data Protection was ignored."

Lothian and Borders police took in excess of six months to address media inquiries about their role in the distribution of the interview tapes. Mrs Sheridan says she is now "compelled" to seek judicial review of the OFCOM decision.

"I've never asked Ofcom to help me in the past and won't bother in the future as they obviously stick up for the powerful not the powerless. The BBC should have shown more respect for my privacy in this matter and been unwilling to use an illegally obtained and thus soiled video. It was not the BBC's finest hour and Ofcom have let me down. I am compelled to seek a judicial review of this decision."

Mrs Sheridan is represented by media specialist Campbell Deane of Bannatyne Kirkwood and France