BBC reporter tells court she took ‘utmost care’ with Gerry Adams allegation

A BBC reporter has told Dublin’s High Court that she took the “utmost care and responsibility” with the allegation that Gerry Adams had sanctioned the killing of a spy.

After a source made the claim in an interview, Jennifer O’Leary said she was on the road “non-stop” and held 60 meetings, including with seven serving garda sources.

Mr Adams is suing the BBC over what he has called a “grievous smear” included in a documentary that alleged he sanctioned the killing of a former Sinn Fein official revealed to be an informer.

He claims a BBC Spotlight programme, and an accompanying online story, defamed him by alleging he sanctioned the killing of Denis Donaldson. He denies any involvement.

Mr Donaldson was shot dead in 2006, months after admitting he was a police and MI5 agent for 20 years.

In 2009 the Real IRA claimed responsibility for the killing, and the Spotlight programme was broadcast in September 2016 while a garda investigation into the matter was ongoing.

In the programme, an anonymous source identified as “Martin”, who says he was an informant for Special Branch within the IRA, claimed that the shooting was sanctioned by the political and military leadership of the IRA and that Mr Adams “gives the final say”.

The BBC has said the claim was corroborated by five other sources and the reporter involved said the confidential source who made the allegation would likely be “killed” if their identity was revealed.

Under cross examination by Mr Adams’ barrister, Tom Hogan SC, Spotlight reporter Ms O’Leary said care was taken to corroborate the allegation.

She told the court on Wednesday that after the interview with Martin was recorded, she held 60 meetings with sources and was “non-stop on the road” for months.

“I wouldn’t be here if I couldn’t stand over the programme and the allegations made in the programme,” she told the court.”

When Mr Hogan put it to her that the BBC’s defence did not involve standing over the allegation, she said: “I’m here to defend the journalism Mr Hogan, and the points of law that the case is being defended are points of law.”

She said that the claim was presented as an allegation in the programme and that terms such as “Martin believes” and “Spotlight understands” are used.

“Any reasonable person watching the programme would know we are making an allegation.”

She said it is “not unusual” in journalism to broadcast an allegation.

Ms O’Leary agreed that the word “sanction” which appears in the headline of the online article, is not said by Martin in the Spotlight programme, but said that Martin used the word during his second meeting with her.

She said it was “not unusual” for a headline to reflect the claims in the detail of the article, but said she did not write the article so could not explain the rationale behind it.

In relation to an email she sent to a producer on June 22 2016, Ms O’Leary was asked by Mr Hogan why no one could be told about ‘Martin’.

“Here was a person who, given what he says he was and given the efforts that we went to in terms of filming the interview, and the care that was taken when meeting him, I didn’t want there to be chatter,” she said.

“It’s just a genuine effort to keep things tight out of respect for the source and the story.”

It was put to Ms O’Leary that certain voices were omitted from the programme that were contradicting or were “taking away from the allegation that you really wanted to make” about Gerry Adams.

Ms O’Leary said: “There was no allegation that I really wanted to make.”

Judge Alexander Owens said Mr Hogan was suggesting that a statement from the Donaldson family was “yanked” out to make the allegation against Mr Adams “a bit bigger”.

“No, that is not true,” Ms O’Leary said.

Mr Hogan suggested that she had “excluded unhelpful comments that contradicted what you wanted to say”.

Ms O’Leary said that the Donaldson family statement “wasn’t excluded because it wasn’t helpful”, but because she had not spoken to the Donaldson family and that part of the programme was “based on sources that I spoke to”.

“It was in the public interest to include the Adams allegation,” she told the court, and added: “Was I to ignore it?”

She said there was a need to “systematically and rigorously” test the allegation, which is why she was on the road “non-stop” for months and had met Martin 10 times by the time the programme was broadcast.

“I went out of my way to meet as many people and sources as I could.”

When Mr Hogan suggested that the other anonymous sources she met were “dubious” and were only asked to confirm allegations, Ms O’Leary said she rejected her sources being referred to as “dubious”.

She said that if anyone had said “stop”, she would have listened to what they said.

“I’m not sitting there like a robot and not challenging them during those conversations,” she said.

She said she spoke to security sources on both sides of the border, and that she met seven sources from An Garda Siochana, including “serving, senior” Garda sources.

Asked about her experience, she said she was appointed as a Spotlight reporter in 2012 and “proved myself in that role fairly fast”.

“I was well capable of getting stuck in and getting good stories and getting sign-off and being forensic in the work that I did.”

She added: “I’d be out on my ear if anyone at editorial level at the BBC thought I had an agenda.”