Social Items

TPQ
Showing posts with label Gerry Adams & London Legal Case. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gerry Adams & London Legal Case. Show all posts
John Ware ✍ rejects both the form and content of a recent faux characterisation of his journalistic standards. 

I don't know Niall Meehan, but I read that he is the former "Head of the Journalism and Media Faculty" at a private college in Dublin.

So he will know that scepticism, curiosity, and an open mind are key to fair minded, ethical journalism for which I dare say he sees himself as one of Ireland's custodians.

Unfortunately, these qualities were absent in a series of ad hominem attacks he recently posted about me.

First, by buying incuriously into a classic example of moral confusion in The Phoenix with the inference that I was a Very Bad person for giving evidence in court recently against Gerry Adams who spent two days in the witness box denying he'd ever been in the IRA.

I have no difficulty justifying breaking my off-the-record undertaking of 43 years ago to his right-hand man, Danny Morrison. While, of course, I maintained it for the purposes of my programme about Adams and Morrison in 1983, it was rather more conscience-testing in the face of Adams' latest chutzpah attempt to rewrite history on oath. Since I was in possession of a relevant piece of evidence contradicting his outlandish denial of IRA membership (so insulting to IRA victims), when I was asked to provide it, I took the view that there was a much greater obligation to the victims, the general public and the historical record, than to Danny Boy. The war has, after all, been over for almost three decades! Furthermore, all political parties including Sinn Fein always insist that legacy victims are the priority when this is so obviously untrue. Finally, let's remember that collusion by silence cuts both ways - whether covering up awful crimes by the State or by the IRA, although not, it seems, to Messrs Meehan and The Phoenix.

Second, my reported comments to Ian "Butch" Studdard in 1983 have been taken right out of context. Studdard was in thrall to Adams, and didn't mind who knew it. If I said what he says I said, it will have been a deliberately provocative satirical riposte to his face for his fawning over Adams. I certainly recall being told that Studdard had warned Adams in advance that I was investigating his claims never to have been a member of the IRA which was a grossly unprofessional and uncollegiate thing to do.

Third, Meehan references a 39 year old article which I wrote as a contribution to an investigation by the much respected Ireland correspondent of The Independent David McKittrick in which we suggested Colin Wallace - an army press officer and part time UDR solider who alleged there was an intelligence services smear campaign against certain MPs - was also something of a Walter Mitty. And, that one way of testing his credibility was to examine the derring-do claims he made about his exploits as a display parachutist at public events with two army teams called The Phantoms - whom he said he commanded - and the Black Knights. 

Wallace complained to the Press Council who ticked me off for preferring the evidence which suggested Wallace had bragged about his parachuting achievements, whilst simultaneously accepting there was "clearly room for rival versions...".  It was a bizzare verdict but in any case, readers can judge for themselves which version they prefer based on the research that I conducted.

In raising the Wallace business, The Phoenix makes the smeary suggestion that I was part and parcel of an establishment attempt to discredit evidence that "state forces (had) promoted illegal (sic) loyalist violence." This was a silly thing to do because a couple of google clicks would have demonstrated the opposite. My work for the BBC on collusion between agents working for military intelligence and special branch led to the Stevens 2 and Stevens 3 inquiries, as recognised by Sir John Stevens himself and by the Irish government at the time. Also, in the government commissioned report that found extensive State collusion in the assassination of Patrick Finucane, the late Sir Desmond de Silva QC said:

I should also record that retired senior intelligence officers, and the former BBC journalist John Ware, also engaged extensively with the work of my Review and provided me with important evidence and insights. Their assistance was provided voluntarily and was extremely valuable in enabling me to produce this Report.

I mention this only to demonstrate the puerility of The Phoenix's journalism and Meehan's apparent respect for it. Incidentally, if it's ethical values they're in search of, they will find an exploration of them over 18 chapters in my book (Neither Conform Nor Deny) due to be published next month. It's a forensic analysis of the moral maze into which the British State ventured by always prioritising the protection of agents over the criminal justice system and sometimes over life itself during the NI conflict.

Finally, Meehan draws attention to claims made about me and the BBC by an Al Jazeera journalist called Richard Sanders and a barrister, Martin Forde KC.

As with his other posts, Niall Meehan's incuriosity prevented him from seeking my side for each of the stories he cites. But he's in good company with Messrs Sanders and Forde whose allegation that I and my Panorama colleagues misleadingly edited an email in a programme about Jeremy Corbyn, is completely untrue and objectively so. The real mischief is in the way Al Jazeera reported the edit. Both Sanders and Forde ignored a courteous letter drafted by the BBC legal department to Forde which he refused to discuss followed by repeated attempts by me to patiently demonstrate how he and Al Jazeera had got the detail round their necks - not to put too fine a point on it. It may come as no surprise that a journalist failed to grapple with the detail wherein lies the devil, but one expects better from a KC. KCs are not infallible, after all. In my opinion, and in the opinion of the BBC, Forde and Sanders' conduct over this was intolerably high-handed.
 
For those still interested, the detail is laid out here - with some unsettling reflections on Messrs Sanders and Forde's approach to reasoned, evidence-based argument . . .  and the ethical standards of Al Jazeera's journalism, at least in this case here.

John Ware, a veteran investigative journalist, is author of
the upcoming book Neither Confirm Nor Deny.

Incurious Journey

Christy Walsh ✍ Did Gerry A dodge a bullet because of courtroom technicalities on costs? Does the legacy of an IRA icon pick up his £400K legal bills?

Background of the Case

Whenever Gerry Adams steps into a courtroom, the air thickens with a peculiar brand of legal gymnastics.

The case was brought by John Clark, a victim of the 1973 Old Bailey bombing in London; Jonathan Ganesh, a 1996 London Docklands bombing victim; and Barry Laycock, a victim of the 1996 Arndale shopping centre bombing in Manchester. On the surface, it was a quest for truth.

£1 for the Open Secret

The claimants played a clever hand, or so they thought. By asking for a mere £1 in ‘vindicatory’ damages, they attempted to strip the case of monetary motive and dress it in the robes of a ‘Truth Commission’. They weren't looking for a payout; they were looking for a judicial stamp on the open secret of Adams' IRA leadership.

But in the English High Court, 'truth' is an expensive commodity, and the gatekeepers are the statutes of limitation. Adams' defence was predictable: the clock had run out. Why sue in 2022 for the sins of 1973? The claimants argued that Adams' own ‘fraudulent concealment’ of his IRA membership made earlier litigation impossible. It was a bold move - asking a judge to ignore the calendar because the defendant is a world-class escape artist.

The Costs Trap: Justice by Intimidation

The narrative collapse didn't happen because the evidence was found wanting; it happened because of something called Qualified One-Way Costs Shifting (QOCS). Under normal circumstances, QOCS are a shield that makes justice accessible for those who cannot afford high legal costs.

Adams' lawyers argued to breach the claimants' QOCS protection by alleging 'abuse of process' - and Justice Swift hinted they might succeed. If the judge formally ruled it an ‘abuse’, the cost-protection would vanish instantly. The victims weren't just looking at losing a pound; they were looking at a £400,000 bill from Adams' top-tier London legal team (see Joshua Rozenberg's analysis[1]).

Faced with the prospect of losing their homes to pay for the defence of the man they were accusing, the claimants did what any rational person would do: they folded.

The ‘No Order’ Paradox

The case ended on a "no order as to costs" basis. Adams spins this as a vindication. It is anything but. It was a tactical retreat. Adams got to walk away without the ‘IRA Leader’ tag being legally glued to his lapel, and the victims walked away without a debt that would haunt their grandchildren.

But Adams' lawyers didn't work for free. Adams' defence was elite, expensive, and extensive. If he cannot recover those costs from the men who sued him, who is footing the bill?

The Shadow of the Trust

This brings us back to a perennial Pensive Quill question: The Bobby Sands Trust (BST). Adams remains a permanent trustee of the BST, an entity that continues to guard the copyrights of a hunger striker with the tenacity of a corporate conglomerate. As documented here since 2016, the Trust operates in a financial vacuum - no published accounts, no transparency, and a ‘half-secret’ status that would make a Cayman Islands banker blush.

Is it a leap too far to wonder if the royalties from One Day in My Life - written by a man who died for the IRA - are being used to pay the legal fees of a man who swears he was never in the IRA? If the BST is acting as Adams' financial bodyguard, then Bobby Sands's legacy has been effectively weaponized to protect a man who denies any role in the IRA and the history of the struggle.

Neither side left with what they wanted. Intimidating financial costs keeps secrets classified and money hidden. The only thing 'firmly under wraps' is the truth: "Was Gerry A in the Ra?"

*For background on the Bobby Sands Trust see earlier coverage here: 


References


⏩ Christy Walsh was stitched up by the British Ministry of Defence in a no jury trial and spent many years in prison as a result.

Classified 🪶"Was Gerry A In The Ra?" 🪶 Alleged IRA Ties Remain Firmly Under Wraps

Muiris Ó Súilleabháin ✍ The Oxford English Dictionary defines a smear as an attempt to damage someone’s reputation by saying unpleasant things that are untrue.

The civil case against Gerry Adams fizzled out last week, just as many suspected it would. In that narrow respect, I find myself on the unfamiliar ground of agreeing with Adams and Sinn Féin that the case should never have reached the courts. That, however, is where any agreement ends. My own view is simpler: no one should ever again find themselves in the dock over a conflict that ended almost thirty years ago.

I am no lawyer, and I have genuine sympathy for the three victims of the IRA who brought the case. But they appear to have been badly advised and insufficiently alert to the financial risks that civil litigation carries.

I know nothing of how the case began. I can only take the plaintiffs at their word: that they were innocent victims of the IRA seeking the same truth and justice that should be available to all who suffered during the conflict.

Having followed the proceedings closely, I was struck by how thin the evidence against Adams actually was. Stripped of presentation and theatre, it amounted largely to repetition: material long in circulation, drawn from public sources, and allegations that have persisted for decades without substantiation, many of them traceable to British military and RUC Special Branch briefings. John Ware aside, there was little that could honestly be described as new, and even less that could be described as probative. On the few occasions when Adams came under pressure in the witness box, I admit I felt a brief flicker of schadenfreude. It did not last. The reality remained that this was a British court.

It came as no surprise that former IRA figures who had served alongside Adams were not prepared to appear in a British court to testify against him. That remained true even of those who had since broken with the strategy he led or had criticised him publicly. For Irish republicans, participation in a British court attempting to adjudicate on the legitimacy or conduct of the armed struggle remains a line that is not crossed.

In that context, Shane Paul cut a sad and isolated figure, separated from a wider tradition which, whatever its internal quarrels, still maintains its red lines.

The fact that the trial was years in the making gave Adams and Sinn Féin ample time to choreograph their response. The arrival at court in a top-of-the-range Land Rover, wearing an Israeli-made bulletproof vest and accompanied by a security team using Israeli-made communications equipment, was a mistake. The choice of public-facing security personnel was deliberate. It included men who had played a central role in policing the peace and suppressing dissent in Belfast. The message was understood.

Adams had raised the stakes even before proceedings began, issuing a carefully worded statement pre-trial in which, he said, his primary concern was for the victims, while insinuating that they had been manipulated by darker forces intent on advancing the case. He cast it as a full-frontal assault by the British establishment on the legitimacy of the republican struggle.

Safe in the knowledge that this was not, in fact, what the case was, Adams doubled down on the same performance on the opening day outside the court. Saint Gerry of the peace process was once again being victimised by perfidious Albion. It was not Gerry on trial, we were invited to believe, but the republican struggle itself, of which he was merely the embodiment, guilty only of being an Irish republican.

The evidence presented against him told a different story. Had either the British or Irish governments wanted this case to succeed, they could have strategically leaked contemporaneous documents from multiple sources to help make that happen, not least material from figures such as Scappaticci or “Wee Roy”, Gerry’s former driver. The outcome of the case was always set to vindicate not just Adams, but the peace process and both governments that underwrote it.

And that is the heart of it. The case, the evidence, and the outcome changed no one’s mind. Not about the legitimacy of the armed struggle, and not about who or what Gerry Adams was, or remains. Like many others, I do not need a British court to tell me what I know, or what I do not know.

What the case did confirm was something else: the extent to which Adams is prepared to construct and defend a legacy as a man of peace. He is not a foolish man. Given months to prepare, his evidence was delivered without error. There were no slips, no deviations, no uncertainty.

He joined Sinn Féin. It was separate from the IRA. He was never in the IRA. Former comrades were recast as liars or disappointments. Presidents, prime ministers and Taoisigh were mistaken. He had delivered the peace process to the British “on a plate” and, in doing so, had brought the IRA to heel. Resentment followed. The allegation that he had been a member of the IRA was framed not as history, but as smear. He was, he insisted, a man of peace, not an IRA volunteer.

At times, I was unsure whether we were part of the same movement. Sinn Féin was always an army project, even at the point when I left. That was understood internally, whatever was said publicly.

Some of the commentary now circulating, often from those who should know better, suggests otherwise. It reflects not confusion, but revisionism. The past is being recast by people who were either not there or not yet lucid enough to understand what it was they were looking at.

Within the movement, to say that someone was a member of the IRA was never a smear. Many regret their involvement. Very few are ashamed of it. Fewer still would have described it as an unpleasant or false accusation.

That is why the spectacle of former IRA volunteers now supporting Adams, as he recasts IRA membership as a smear, is so difficult to reconcile. It is not ambiguity. It is contradiction, openly stated.

The contradictions were once again visible as Gerry delivered his valedictory speech on returning to Belfast. Standing beneath a mural of IRA Volunteer Bobby Sands, he again asserted that he had never been in the IRA. Behind him stood Sinn Féin MPs and MLAs, arranged and attentive, their presence signalling adulation and loyalty.

At the same time, multiple Sinn Féin TDs, MLAs and MPs issued near-identical statements across social media. Only Mary Lou McDonald and Michelle O’Neill diverged. The message was uniform: Gerry had gone to the belly of the beast and struck another blow for Irish freedom.

Gerry repeated his concern for the victims who had brought the case. If it was delivered sincerely, it sat uneasily with the reality that one of those involved in planting the bombs stood alongside him.

And so it ended.

⏩Muiris Ó Súilleabháin was a member of the Republican Movement until he retired in 2006 after 20 years of service. Fiche bhliain ag fás.

The Smear

Anthony McIntyre ☠ For ten hours last week, the former IRA leader Gerry Adams took to the witness box of a London court to deny that he was the former IRA leader Gerry Adams.

Given the allegations made against him, the presiding judge might have felt he was listening to Harold Shipman deny that he was ever a doctor. Like Shipman, the allegations about a body count have been persistent, the Belfast Telegraph 
proclaiming in the immediate wake of his Dublin libel case, Gerry Adams is a man of towering ambition who’d no moral qualms about securing his goal through murder. If the accusations against Adams were upheld as being true - that he was a member of the IRA army council - then critics would feel free to contend that he has been responsible for even more autopsies than Shipman. 

In the end the London case against Adams collapsed, giving him not quite his preferred outcome which was a dismissal of the claim on the basis of the evidence before the court. Still, he got a much better result than the claimants who had issued the proceedings against him. And it must be conceded that in his post-court media interview in Belfast he spoke truthfully about one matter - the claimants had been badly advised from the outset - leaving the observer to wonder if they were prompted to take the case by the same element that badly advised them.

While some of the Trump-style lying in London opened him to ridicule - as in his nonsensical contention that he was not the author of the Brownie columns - apologists for Adams have long insisted that he must deny IRA membership otherwise he would be prosecuted and imprisoned. Yet, as Brendan Hughes observed in the H Blocks some months before his release in 1986, he would not expect Adams to admit membership for that very reason, but went on to point out the obvious: a mere 'no comment' would suffice to prevent prosecution. There was no need to lie about membership.

The real reason for the unrelenting organised lying is arguably the need to give cover to those movers, shakers and gatekeepers in the world of politics who could open doors to an extended and enhanced political career for Adams whereby he could prance around as Percy Pompous on the national and international stage, a human rights champion, a statesman, so long as he kept his end of the bargain and strangled the IRA, forcing it to accept British terms for disengagement - unity only by consent. In rendering himself a major asset (as distinct from an agent) to the rich and powerful of this world, his disavowal of IRA membership made it easier for them to open doors for the man they could do business with, while simultaneously serving as the lubricant with which he could oil the wheels of his political career.

Does the London ruling change anything? Not in the slightest. Nobody who last Sunday believed Adams to have been in the IRA believes this Sunday that he was not in it. Even had he lost, it would have changed the minds of no one. A judgement that he had been a member of the IRA would have been less uncomfortable for him than it would have been for the British state. A court finding against Adams would have left the state exposed for having - despite all its protestations to the contrary that it had never talked with 'terrorists' - previously negotiated with a person legally acknowledged as an IRA figure, even allowing him to cross the threshold of 10 Downing Street. For the British, better that such is left judicially unsaid. 

Perhaps the institutional instinct of the judge kicked in. As a barrister Jonathan Swift's “favourite clients were the security and intelligence agencies”, so he was well positioned to readily understand  how any ruling was likely to play out. He, rather than the Adams legal team, raised the issue of a possible abuse of process which in the end relieved him of any responsibility to make a determination on the merits of the case. While much less robust on the bombings of English cities the evidence of membership seemed pretty compelling in circumstances where only a balance of probability slope had to be scaled in order to reach the summit of culpability. So, while Adams rails against the British establishment's supposed involvement in the case, that same establishment secured the outcome most suitable to it. The London court case was no battle between Gerry Adams and the British state, but a common purpose enterprise that both satisfied and sanctified the preservation of a legal fiction  beneficial to both.

Gerry Adams is fortunate. He lied for Ireland into his seventies while others died for it in their teens and twenties. He was regarded by key colleagues as an effective, ruthless and courageous, but ultimately unsuccessful, IRA leader. The guerrilla organisation of which he is reputed to have been chief of staff in 1977-78 spent almost thirty years replacing the unity only by consent principle with . . . the unity only by consent principle: a truth as irrefutable as it is uncomfortable for those who prefer to mystify it by seeking validation not in breaking from London but through lying in London. 

⏩Follow on Bluesky.

Shipman & Adams

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)