Julian O’Neill
BBC News NI crime and justice correspondent
Reporting fromDublin High Court
Brian Lawless/PA Wire
Gerry Adams pictured outside the High Court in Dublin last week
The BBC has opened its defence in a libel case brought by Gerry Adams, who claims he was defamed in a broadcast and article which alleged he sanctioned the murder of a British agent.
Eoin McCullough SC, acting for the broadcaster, told the High Court in Dublin the allegation had been “thoroughly investigated”.
He also stated it would have been “irresponsible” for the information to be ignored.
Mr Adams denies any involvement in the 2006 killing of Denis Donaldson – who for 20 years was a spy for the police and MI5 inside Sinn Féin.
A 2016 programme by Spotlight included an anonymous source called Martin making the claim against Mr Adams.
Martin was interviewed by the programme, but his identity was hidden and his words were spoken by an actor.
He was described by Spotlight as an informer within the IRA.
Addressing the 12-person jury, Mr McCullough said the programme had multiple sources for Martin’s central claim.
“Martin gave her (reporter Jennifer O’Leary) information it would have been irresponsible to ignore.
“She didn’t just take him at face value. The allegations he made were thoroughly investigated,” Mr McCullough stated.
He said the BBC is defending the case on two main grounds – it disputes Mr Adams’ claim about the meaning of the story and that it was “a fair and reasonable” publication on a matter of public interest.
He also said Mr Adams is entitled to no damages because of his reputation as an IRA leader until 2005 – something Mr Adams rejects.
“The article and broadcast don’t mean that Mr Adams sanctioned and approved the murder,” Mr McCullough said.
“You’ll see the BBC reported that Martin had made that allegation, but it made clear it was an allegation only and it made clear Mr Adams said it was nonsense.”
He also explained the idea behind fair publication “is a simple one”.
“A journalist is entitled to publish material as long as the material is in the public interest and as long as he or she is doing so in good faith and acts fairly and reasonably.”
He said “great care” was taken around gathering responses to the allegation and that the editorial processes had been “painstaking”.
Crucially, he said, it is wrong for Mr Adams to suggest the story was based on a single anonymous source.
Mr McCullough said among the BBC’s witnesses is an expert who will state that had Mr Adams made a complaint to the broadcasting regulator, Ofcom, it would not have succeeded.
Reporter ‘didn’t have an agenda against Gerry Adams’
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BBC Spotlight reporter Jennifer O’Leary and BBC Northern Ireland Director Adam Smyth pictured outside the High Court in Dublin at an earlier hearing
The lawyer then called Ms O’Leary to testify – she was the reporter on the Spotlight programme.
Beginning her evidence, Ms O’Leary said she had been a BBC reporter since 2011.
She said she had no animosity towards the former Sinn Féin president: “I didn’t have an agenda against Gerry Adams.
“You just do a story. It doesn’t matter who it is about.”
Ms O’Leary said her first inkling of a potential story on Denis Donaldson was when contacts told her the IRA had murdered him and “let dissidents make the claim of responsibility”.
She had met the source Martin while making a different Spotlight film.
While his identity is known to her, she said to publicly reveal it would likely led to him being killed.
She said she was able to verify information about him, including his involvement with Sinn Féin.
Under questioning from Mr McCullough, Ms O’Leary said before the broadcast she had several sources who made similar claims to Martin.
These were two individuals within republicanism and others in Northern Ireland security circles.
Throughout her evidence, she read from notes she had taken during her dealings with them.
Ms O’Leary said she could not name any of her republican sources “because they fear recriminations”.
Referring to her notes of a meeting with one republican source, she told the court it said: “Donaldson would have come from the top. Adams would have been aware.”
Earlier, the jury was played a video of news extracts from the 1990s onwards, which showed Mr Adams’ involvement in the Northern Ireland peace process.
It was put together by his legal team.
Lasting 14 minutes, it shows Mr Adams meeting, amongst others, former US president Bill Clinton and Nelson Mandela, the ex-president of South Africa.
It ends with a handshake between Mr Adams and the then Prince Charles in Galway in 2015.
Mr Justice Alexander Owens told the jury it is an example of “good publicity” put together by Mr Adams’ lawyers, which “may be a bit flattering”.
Mr Adams’ reputation has become a central feature of the case.
The court was also told that the Spotlight programme at the centre of the case had a viewership on 15,800 people in Ireland when it was broadcast in September 2016.
The accompanying online story had around 750 hits in Ireland between 2016 and 2017.
The case is now in its third week.
Who was Denis Donaldson?
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Denis Donaldson was a key figure in Sinn Féin and worked closely with both Mr Adams and former Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness
Mr Donaldson was once a key figure in Sinn Féin’s rise as a political force in Northern Ireland but he was found murdered in 2006 after it emerged he had been a spy.
He was interned without trial for periods in the 1970s.
After the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, Sinn Féin appointed Mr Donaldson as its key administrator in the party’s Stormont offices.
In 2005, Mr Donaldson confessed he was a spy for British intelligence for two decades, before disappearing from Belfast.
He was found dead in a small, run down cottage in Glenties, County Donegal.
Who is Gerry Adams?
Mr Adams was the president of republican party Sinn Féin from 1983 until 2018.
He served as MP in his native Belfast West from 1983 to 1992 and again from 1997 until 2011 before sitting as a TD (Teachta Dála) in the Dáil (Irish parliament) between 2011 and 2020.
Mr Adams led the Sinn Féin delegation during peace talks that eventually brought an end to the Troubles after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.
He was detained in the early 1970s when the government in Northern Ireland introduced internment without trial for those suspected of paramilitary involvement.
Mr Adams has consistently denied being a member of the IRA.
