The decision of a jury in the Dublin High Court to award defamation damages to the republican leader Gerry Adams “is like spitting on 1,800 graves”, the son of a man murdered by the IRA has said.
Austin Stack was speaking in the wake of Mr Adams being awarded €100,000 for damage to his reputation arising from a 2016 BBC programme, where it was alleged he sanctioned the killing by the IRA of republican informer Denis Donaldson in 2006.
“It makes a mockery of the 1,800 people that the IRA and the republican movement killed,” Mr Stack said. “It is a complete mockery. It is like spitting on 1,800 graves, giving that man that money.”
Mr Stack (56) was a teenager in 1983 when his father, Brian, then the chief prison officer in Portlaoise Prison, was shot by the IRA on South Circular Road, Dublin. He was in a coma for six months, was paralysed from the neck down after he came out of the coma, and died 18 months after the shooting.
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Mr Stack was “extremely disappointed” by the outcome of the trial, where the BBC wanted to call him as a witness. This was not allowed by the trial judge who decided his evidence would not be relevant to the questions the jury had to answer.
“As a victim of the Troubles I believe that this has been another attempt by Sinn Féin - we have had a litany of individuals from that organisation, and I believe that this is the second or third one from Gerry Adams himself - where they are attempting to shut down the debate about the past,” Mr Stack said.
“I think that the fact that Gerry Adams took the case down here rather than in the UK speaks volumes in relation to our defamation laws.”
The loss of his father had a terrible and enduring effect on him and his family, Mr Stack said.
His mother and his family had never received any compensation for what happened to them.
[ Gerry Adams v BBC libel case: What the jury didn’t hearOpens in new window ]
“It is quite galling for people like me to see that Adams and his people are trying to change the narrative of what happened in the Troubles,” Mr Stack said.
“They are trying to whitewash it for the younger generation, romanticise it for the young. Adams tries to come across as your cuddly, grandfather type, you know, like they were out on boy scout missions.”
