The broadcaster lost a major defamation case earlier this year after Mr Adams took them to court over a 2016 episode of its Spotlight programme
Former Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams (Brian Lawless/PA)
Gerry Adams has said he has made donations to “good causes” after the BBC paid the former Sinn Fein president 100,000 euro (£84,000) in defamation damages.
The broadcaster lost a defamation case earlier this year after Mr Adams took them to court over a 2016 episode of its Spotlight programme and an accompanying online story.
They contained an allegation that Mr Adams sanctioned the killing of former Sinn Fein official Denis Donaldson.
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[D]onations have been made to “Unicef for the children of Gaza”, local GAA organisations, a support group for republican prisoners and their families called An Cumman Cabhrach, to the Irish language sector, to the “homeless and Belfast based-youth, mental health and suicide prevention projects” and others. …
Former Sinn Féin leader sued broadcaster over allegation in documentary that he sanctioned murder of MI5 informant
Gerry Adams has won a defamation action against the BBC over a documentary that carried a claim he sanctioned the murder of an MI5 informant in 2006.
A jury at Dublin’s high court on Friday found that the BBC had not acted in good faith or in a fair and reasonable way and awarded the former Sinn Féin leader €100,000 (£84,000) in damages
The verdict came after a high-profile four-week trial that scrutinised Adams’s alleged membership of the IRA and his role during Northern Ireland’s Troubles and peace process.
Lawyers for Adams accused the BBC of a “grievous smear” and “hatchet job”. Lawyers for the broadcaster defended the documentary and said the libel action was a cynical attempt to launder Adams’s reputation.
The former West Belfast MP said a BBC Spotlight documentary and accompanying online article defamed him in 2016 by claiming he had sanctioned the murder of Denis Donaldson, a former Sinn Féin official who was shot dead in County Donegal months after admitting he had for decades been a police and MI5 informant. The claim about Adams was made by an anonymous source known only as “Martin”.
Keir Starmer is looking at ‘every conceivable way’ to block compensation for myself and over 300 people wrongly imprisoned in the 1970s — an arrogance in full keeping with the British establishment’s imperial mindset.
According to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, his government is looking at ‘every conceivable way’ to prevent me and at least 300 other people from receiving compensation for wrongful arrest and imprisonment in the 1970s.
This issue of compensation arises from the decision by the British Supreme Court in May 2020 that the Interim Custody Order (ICO) or internment order issued against me was unlawful.
Internment was demanded by the Unionist government in 1971 and imposed by the British on 9 August of that year. It had been used in every decade since partition in 1920. Internment saw thousands of armed troops smash their way into nationalist homes to arrest 342 men and boys.
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The Supreme Court quashed my two convictions. But the Department of Justice in the North decided in 2021 that I was ineligible for compensation. I challenged this decision. In April 2023 Justice Colton concluded that it was ‘beyond reasonable doubt that there has been a miscarriage of justice, that is, the applicant is innocent of the crime for which he was convicted.’ He added: ‘I am satisfied that the applicant meets the test for compensation under the Criminal Justice Act 1988.’
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Mr Starmer’s stated intention to subvert the laws he is supposed to uphold will come as no surprise to those in Ireland and in countless other states around the world who have experienced British colonial law. The self-proclaimed leading British counter-insurgency expert Frank Kitson described it well in his 1971 manual, Low-Intensity Operations: Subversion, Insurgency & Peacekeeping:
‘The law should be used as just another weapon in the Government’s arsenal, and in this case it becomes little more than a propaganda cover for the disposal of unwanted members of the public.’
So I will continue to pursue this case. I have no personal interest in compensation for myself. If any comes to me at the end of this process, I will donate it to good causes.
