In this paper, we examine an unequal error protection (UEP) scheme for wireless imaging that is based on utilizing the distributed diversity offered by decode-and-forward (DF) networks. Specifically, the data stream after source encoding is divided into high and low priority sub-streams depending on their importance for image reconstruction. A relay-selection combining (R-SC) scheme is exploited for high priority image data to achieve high reliability while cooperative spatial multiplexing is employed to low priority image data to support high spectral efficiency. In this work, we specifically take into account the setting that relays may forward erroneously detected signals to the destination when cooperating with fixed DF. In this context, the analytical and numerical results validate that R-SC outperforms other relaying protocols in terms of average symbol error probability while the considered UEP approach offers the highest spectral efficiency among the examined relaying schemes.