A libel case brought by Sinn Féin MLA Gerry Kelly against a journalist has been thrown out after a judge ruled it was “scandalous, frivolous and vexatious”.
Mr Kelly was also ordered to pay costs in the case he had brought against Malachi O’Doherty.
The case related to two radio interviews in which the journalist had stated Mr Kelly had shot a prison officer during an escape from the Maze prison in 1983.
The north Belfast Sinn Féin MLA was one of 38 IRA prisoners who escaped from the prison near Lisburn, during which prison officer John Adams was shot in the head.
Mr Kelly has never admitted shooting him and was found not guilty at a trial in 1987.
He claimed the broadcast comments from Mr O’Doherty had damaged his reputation.
However, Mr O’Doherty’s legal team had argued that there was no damage to the MLA’s reputation, as he had served prison sentences for the 1973 Old Bailey bombings and he is someone publicly identified as a former IRA member.
They made an application for the libel action to be struck out, pointing out that Mr Kelly had written books about the escape without naming who fired the shot.
In a judgment published on Monday, the Master of Belfast High Court Evan Bell stated: “What Mr Kelly has written in his books is, in my view, a clear statement of common design in respect of the battery of Mr Adams.
“Even if one accepts the submission that Mr Kelly has not explicitly admitted pulling the trigger, the content of his books appears to make Mr Kelly civilly liable, on the balance of probabilities, for the shooting of Mr Adams.
“In the light of that, these defamation proceedings against Dr O’Doherty are completely untenable.
“For that reason the court strikes them out on the basis that they are scandalous, frivolous and vexatious.”
In the judgment, Master Bell added: “Since the amendment of the law on double jeopardy, where an author has been tried and acquitted of criminal offences, and his criminal memoir contains material which amounts to new and compelling evidence against him, he may expose himself to re-prosecution for that offence under Part 10 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003 if his book contains new evidence.”
The judge said that the libel proceedings, which were brought personally against Mr O’Doherty, bore the hallmarks of a Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPP) case.
He said: “On the balance of probabilities therefore the proceedings do bear the hallmarks of a SLAPP and have been initiated not for the genuine purposes of vindicating a reputation injured by defamatory statements, but rather for the purpose of stifling the voices of his troublesome critics.”
He added: “The abuse of process in this case is so blatant that it would be utterly unjust if the court were to allow the proceedings to continue.
“The court therefore has no hesitation in striking them out.”
Seamus Dooley, NUJ assistant general secretary, said the determination was “extremely significant” in the context of “ongoing concern at the use of strategic lawsuits knows as SLAPPs against journalists in both Northern Ireland and the Republic”.
