A BBC journalist behind a programme at the centre of Gerry Adams‘s defamation action against the broadcaster has rejected a suggestion she set about finding “yes men” to corroborate a claim the former Sinn Féin leader sanctioned the killing of a British agent.
Jennifer O’Leary previously told the High Court the allegation – made to the BBC Spotlight programme by an anonymous contributor dubbed Martin – was corroborated by five different sources.
On Thursday, during the third week of a civil trial hearing into Mr Adams’s action, the reporter said the allegation was checked in good faith, and in the public interest.
Mr Adams claims the Spotlight programme and a related article published in 2016 defamed him by falsely accusing him of sanctioning Denis Donaldson’s killing at a cottage in Glenties, Co Donegal in 2006.
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The BBC denies it defamed Mr Adams, who insists he had no involvement in the death, which dissident republicans claimed responsibility for in 2009.
Continuing his cross-examination of Ms O’Leary on Thursday, Tom Hogan SC put it to the witness that she had set about finding “yes men” who would corroborate the allegation against Mr Adams, such as disaffected republicans and indiscreet security services people.
She rejected this, and said she had spoken to republican sources who supported the peace process, and who did not hold animosity towards Mr Adams. “I wasn’t going to any Tom, Dick or Harry, Mr Hogan, to check the journalism,” she said.
Mr Hogan put it to Ms O’Leary that she had engaged in “ticking boxes”, by speaking to sources who wouldn’t contradict the allegation against Mr Adams, and by receiving Mr Adams’s denial of the allegation. With boxes ticked, she was able to publish the allegation in the knowledge that she wouldn’t have to stand over the allegation, he claimed.
Ms O’Leary said she didn’t agree with the premise of the question, and said she could absolutely stand over her journalism.
Mr Hogan suggested to the witness she hadn’t made the allegation against Mr Adams “bona fide”. She said the journalism was done in good faith, the allegation was checked in good faith, and in the public interest.
Counsel suggested she made the allegation recklessly. “It wasn’t an allegation had made by me. It wasn’t an allegation taken or treated recklessly,” she said.
Ms O’Leary agreed that it had been put to Mr Adams numerous times that he had never previously taken legal action over allegations made against him. Mr Hogan put to her that she could say anything about Mr Adams because he wouldn’t sue.
In response, Ms O’Leary said this was an “outrageous and wrong suggestion” to make.
“Everybody that features in a BBC story is treated in the exact same way,” she said. Mr Adams not having sued before did not mean she had been given “carte blanche” to make a serious allegation about him, she said.
“That is not the case whatsoever,” she said.
Mr Hogan said that in dismissing previous allegations made by the likes of Seán Mac Stíofáin, Dolours Price or “any disaffected IRA man or woman”, Mr Adams had been able to explain why they might have made particular allegations, because he knew their identity.
He said this was not the case with Martin – a single, anonymous person making an unsubstantiated allegation out of the blue.
Explaining why Martin had to be anonymous, Ms O’Leary said that in 2015, according to a PSNI/MI5 report, IRA men were trying to identify “human intelligence” sources. She said “you can be sure” there would be an interest in identifying Martin, “who was talking about his experience about being an informer”.
Gwyneth Jones, who was deputy editor of Spotlight at the time the programme was published, described the programme as a well-researched, well-considered, much scrutinised piece of significant, public interest journalism.
Under cross-examination Ms Jones said she didn’t agree with Mr Adams’s counsel Declan Doyle’s description of the allegation about the former Sinn Féin president as the programme’s “big reveal”. She said the term was hinting at a sensationalist exposé.
When Mr Doyle suggested the programme was exactly that – a sensationalist exposé about Mr Adams − she said she disagreed with the characterisation, adding that the tone was measured and the language precise.
Ms Jones agreed that the BBC is not contending in the case that the allegation about Mr Adams is true. She said the broadcaster is “robustly” putting up a different defence in the case.
“We are standing over the journalism in the programme,” she said.
The trial, before Mr Justice Alexander Owens, continues.
