The Gazette 1974

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"Do you think that this sex stuff will help sell your
paper in Christian I r e l a n d / It will finish it off. Please
stop it before it is too late. Whatever member of your
staff is the master sex minder should get the door,"
continued Mr. O'Dwyer's letter.
On June 3, The Sunday World in its letters column
published two letters, one in the name of Rev. Francis
O'Doherty, Clonskea, Dublin, said :
"Where the comments of Mr. L. O'Dwyer of Bantry
are concerned, he obviously must have enlisted the aid
of a magnifying glass in order to ascertain what could
or could not be seen in the photograph . . ." the letter
added.
The second letter in the name of Richard Power,
, of Trinity College, Dublin, said that Mr.
O'Dwyer's letter had promoted a discussion involving
five post-graduates of psychology in the college library
and the conclusion unanimously was that Mr. O'Dwyer
"suffers from a form of sexual aberration which, unfor-
tunately, is too often seen in the country areas of
Ireland where sex education in schools is so sadly
lacking."
Fictitious letter writers
Mr. O'Dwyer stated that to the best of his knowledge
and belief there were no such persons as Rev. Francis
O'Doherty of Clonskea, or Richard Power, an of
Trinity College. He claimed that he had been greatly
prejudiced and injured in his credit and reputation and
had been brought into public scandal, contempt and
ridicule by the letters.
Sunday Newspapers Ltd., in defence, claimed that
by writing to The Sunday World the plaintiff impliedly
invited other persons to reply to his letter and invited
the defendants to publish such letters.
The defendants had no reason to believe that
the letters were not authentic and had no duty to the
plaintiff to investigate the authenticity of letters in
reply to his.
They held that the words in the letters were true in
substance and in fact and were fair comment made in
good faith without malice.
Bogus Letters
Mr. O'Dwyer said that after the publication of the
two letters he felt very embarrassed and deeply insulted
and his wife and family had similar feelings. He was
suspicious that they were genuine letters and investi-
gated both of them and found they were, in fact,
bogus.
Rev. James Murray, C.C., Clonskea, said there was
no such person or clergyman of any other denomination
in the parish as "Rev. Francis O'Doherty".
Dermot Sherlock, assistant secretary of records at
Trinity College, said there was no person of the name
of Richard Power either as a student in the college or
as a graduate holding a degree.
Kevin Marron, deputy editor of The Sunday World
and responsible for the letters column in June last,
said he passed Mr. O'Dwyer's letter for publication.
It would not be practicable for a newspaper to check
the identity of all persons who >vrote letters to the
editor.
Mr. Noel Peart, S.C., for the defendants, submitted
that although the letters complained of might be defam-
atory of Mr. O'Dwyer, they were not actionable because
he had brought them on himself.
"Scurrilous references are criminal"
Judge Neylon said it had to be accepted that a per-
son writing to a newspaper would probably receive a
lot of replies and the paper was entitled to publish the
replies even though they might be critical in form but
still within the law. "But what is not acceptable is that
a person should go outside the bounds of a proper
reply and make accusations of a very anti-social, crim-
inal and degrading nature. Newspapers are not entitled
to indulge in that kind of a reply.
" In this case I think the replies were made by
anonyihous people whose identity was not checked by
the paper. Those identities were followed up by the
plaintiff and found to be bogus people masquerading in
the paper under respectable titles.
"The plaintiff is, in my opinion, entitled to recover
damages and recover such damages as to show that
those scurrilous references which amount to criminality
cannot, and will not be tolerated by any decent society,
he concluded.
[O'Dwyer v. Sunday Newspapers Ltd.; Judge Ney-
lon; unreported; 29 February 1974.]
Court frees Belfast woman after five-month extradition
case.
A young Belfast woman was freed by District Justice
Carr in Bray (Co. Wicklow) Court yesterday, when he
refused an application for an extradition order against
her. She is Marguerite O ' Ha r e, of Andersonstown,
Belfast.
Mrs. O ' Ha re first came before the Court in Bray last
September and two days were fixed in the following
month to hear legal arguments on the question of the
validity of the Royal Ulster Constabulary warrant for
her arrest. On the face of the warrant she was charged
with shooting with intent to murder Warrant Officer
Fraser Patton at Andersonstown, Belfast, on 25 October
1971.
At the close of the arguments the hearing was
adjourned to give the District Justice an opportunity to
consider his decision. In the meantime, he took ill so
the matter was adjourned and it was further adjourned
on various dates until yesterday, again before District
Justice Carr.
Seven reasons for refusing extradition
Reading his judgment, he set out seven reasons f°r
refusing the application. He held that the first require-
ment of a valid arrest warrant was that it should sho^
jurisdiction on its face. The warrant in the present case
was issued at Belfast on 11 May 1973 and in his opinion
it was not a valid warrant for a variety of reasons, the
more obvious being that it failed to charge the respon-
dent with any offence or crime; it only recited that a
complaint had been made which alleged a crime by the
respondent. It failed to disclose to whom such a cord-
plaint was made. It failed to disclose that authority)
he was of the opinion that the respondent was arrested)
but the recital of a remand on recognisance on 3 Dec-
1971 implied that the respondent had been taken into
custody. The right to issue an arrest warrant for a
prisoner breaking bail did not survive after the
date to which the person was remanded or the case
adjourned.
The District Justice pointed out that there wa5
nothing to show that any jurisdiction existed on 11 May
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