Solicitor suing Denis O’Brien for defamation denies media ownership report was ‘skewed’
High Court Reporter
Gavin Booth, a lawyer suing Denis O’Brien over an allegedly defamatory press release, has rejected a suggestion that a report on media ownership he is credited with co-authoring was “skewed” against the businessman.
Mr Booth, a solicitor with Belfast human rights firm Phoenix Law, told a High Court jury on Friday that he believed the October 2016 report was independent, balanced and fair, and not designed – as was suggested – to further Sinn Féin’s political agenda.
Mr Booth was giving evidence on the third day of a trial hearing into his and fellow solicitor Darragh Mackin’s defamation action against Mr O’Brien and his spokesman James Morrissey.
The solicitors are suing over a statement Mr O’Brien made in response to the report on media ownership, which was commissioned by then-Sinn Féin MEP Lynn Boylan. Both Mr Booth and Mr Mackin were credited as co-authors of the report.
At the time of the report, Mr O'Brien held substantial stakes in radio and print media companies.
The solicitors claim Mr O’Brien’s statement implied they acted for and received payment from the IRA. They say they were defamed by a sentence in Mr O’Brien’s statement that said: “Sinn Féin/IRA certainly got the report they paid for”.
Mr O’Brien and Mr Morrissey deny the material defamed the solicitors or means what the solicitors allege.
Cross-examining Mr Booth on Friday, Darren Lehane SC put it to the witness that the media ownership report was “skewed” against MrO’Brien, and that this was illustrated in the report’s treatment of a 2015 study compiled by academic Dr Roderic Flynn, which provided much of the source material for the report.
Mr Lehane put to Mr Booth that the study published by Dr Flynn caveated reference to Mr O’Brien’s “dominant position” in the Irish media sector, by noting the countering of this position by RTÉ’s dominance in television and radio.
Mr Lehane, appearing with barrister Joe Holt and instructed by Meagher Solicitors, put to the witness this caveat was not included in the media ownership report’s discussion of Mr O’Brien’s “dominant position”, and that report was not reflective of Dr Flynn’s study.
Mr Booth said he didn’t accept that the report was skewed against Mr O’Brien. He said RTÉ’s dominant position was mentioned in the report.
Mr Booth further denied that the report was designed to advance the political agenda of Sinn Féin. He said that media pluralism and ownership was a cross-party issue in Ireland at the time.
Earlier in his direct evidence, Mr Booth told the jury that he’d been a member of Sinn Féin for two to three years while he was at university.
Put to him by Mr Lehane that the report was heavily critical of Mr O’Brien’s ownership of media in Ireland, and that Mr O’Brien was entitled to respond to this criticism, Mr Booth said he was entitled to respond, but not entitled to allege he was paid by the IRA for the report.
Mr Booth also rejected as “insulting” the defendants’ position that he was not an author of the report. “I was clearly part of the team,” he said.
Led in his evidence-in-chief by Mark Harty SC, appearing with Tom Hogan SC and Conan Fegan BL, instructed by Johnsons Solicitors, Mr Booth on several occasions described Mr O’Brien’s statement as “disgusting”.
Mr Booth said that he’d never been in trouble – at the time, he’d made it to his late 20s without getting so much as a speeding ticket, he said – but suddenly he was being labelled as an IRA sympathiser.
He said he was not someone who took money from terrorists, and that the purported allegation was “totally embarrassing” as someone who was trying to build a career working with victims of the conflict in Northern Ireland.
Earlier, during his cross-examination, Mr Mackin said he was aware prior to the commission of the media ownership report of efforts to agitate for legislation that would place restrictions on media ownership in Ireland, and calls for the legislation to apply retroactively.
