McPhilemy prevails in London libel trial

By Anne Cadwallader

BELFAST — Sean McPhilemy, author of "The Committee," has won a stunning libel victory against the London Sunday Times.

After Thursday’s verdict, McPhilemy thanked his family and supporters when the 12 jurors unanimously awarded him £145,000 libel damages, only £5,000 less than the ceiling set by the judge. They had deliberated for a full week after hearing 50 witnesses over the course of the eight-week trial.

The Times has said it will appeal the verdict, which it called "absurd."

McPhilemy was the executive producer of a television documentary, "The Committee," and the author of the best-selling book by the same name, alleging a criminal conspiracy of RUC officers, businessmen, a lawyer, a minister and loyalist paramilitaries to murder Catholics.

The Sunday Times said that McPhilemy had perpetrated a "hoax" upon the public, but the jury ruled unanimously that the newspaper had failed to prove its allegations or that a high-level murder committee, as featured in the program, did not exist.

McPhilemy, who may be entitled to compensation for loss of earnings, still faces a $100 million libel suit in Washington, however, taken by David and Albert Prentice, two Portadown millionaire car dealers. Under U.S. law he would not be able to recover his legal costs.

His lawyers have moved to have the case dismissed on First Amendment grounds, and a decision is expected by early May.

The London jury was asked six questions by the judge in his summing up of the case:

€ Do you find that the Sunday Times’ article of 9 May, 1993 was defamatory of McPhilemy? (Jury’s answer: Yes)

€ Has the Sunday Times proved on the balance of probabilities that there was no Ulster Central Coordinating Committee as described in the "Dispatches" program on Channel 4 in October 1991? (Answer: No)

€ Has the Sunday Times proved that McPhilemy was deliberately setting out to mislead the viewers? (Answer: No)

€ Has the Sunday Times proved on the balance of probabilities that McPhilemy was reckless as to the truth of the program’s allegations as to the existence or activities of the committee? (Answer: No)

€ Has The Sunday Times succeeded in proving that the article of 9 May, 1993 was substantially accurate? (Answer: No)

€ How much do you award McPhilemy by way of general damages? (Answer: £145,000).

Outside court, McPhilemy said "The jurors have spoken, and they have declared me to be an honest journalist. Although I am happy to have my reputation for integrity restored, my thoughts remain with the victims and their families, and I call again for an independent, international inquiry into allegations raised in the documentary and in my book," he said.

High-profile witnesses

One of the highest-profile witnesses for the newspaper’s unsuccessful defense of its allegations was the Ulster Unionist Party leader, David Trimble, who called the McPhilemy claim that he had been an associate of the Committee "literally unbelievable."

There was not a "single scrap or shred of truth” in the allegations, Trimble told the court. "To say that I was knowingly associating with and assisting people responsible for the murder of my constituents is grossly offensive to me."

After the verdict Trimble’s spokesman said it did not prove that the Committee did exist. He noted that during the trial, McPhilemy had withdrawn allegations he made in his book that Trimble was an associate of the Committee.

Although the existence and membership of the Committee remains unresolved, it was the Sunday Times’ side who chose to make this crucial to their case, bringing in a string of alleged members of the group to deny its existence.

Had it won, it would have claimed the verdict proved the Committee never existed. The paper, however, has not conceded that the McPhilemy victory lends any credibility to the original claims of its existence.

Another Orange Order member allegedly associated with the Committee, Portadown lawyer Richard Monteith, a former chairman of the Human Rights Committee of Northern Ireland Law Society, said that allegations against him by McPhilemy were "nonsense."

Monteith was asked to explain an incident during Drumcree 1996, when he was arrested in the middle of the night by a British Army patrol, after he and another alleged Committee member dragged a cut-down tree across a road during that year’s Orange protests. Monteith testified that he did so "as requested by the Portadown Orangemen," while admitting it was a foolish act.

Alleged Committee chairman and Ulster Bank executive Billy Abernethy never took the stand, despite the jury’s request that he testify. He did file a witness statement, however, vehemently denying the allegations against him.

In particular, he denied being the anonymous driver who took Channel 4 researcher Ben Hamilton to meet the South Armagh commander of the loyalist paramilitary group known as Ulster Resistance.

In a subsequent witness statement, however, Abernethy admitted that his first statement to the court was a deliberate falsification, and that in fact he was the driver, but had been too "embarrassed" to admit it.

In another development, the former head of the RUC Special Branch, alleged Committee member Trevor Forbes, admitted under cross-examination that the RUC had destroyed evidence.

The evidence, an MI5 tape recording of an RUC ambush, in which a suspect was killed, would have revealed whether the RUC had attempted to arrest the suspects (as the RUC alleges), or whether in fact they were simply ambushed and executed.

By contrast, testifying for McPhilemy was a list of journalists who vouched for the quality of McPhilemy’s work, including Channel 4 news chief David Lloyd, former BBC News executive Elizabeth Forgan, and veteran journalist and editor Godfrey Hodgson, who runs the Reuters journalism program at Oxford University.

Russell Smith, attorney for McPhilemy and Roberts Rinehart in the U.S., said, "If this verdict was predictable, as Trimble says, then why is he suing amazon.com, making the same claims that the jury rejected in the Sunday Times case?"

On the Prentice case, Smith said, "If The Sunday Times could not prove recklessness or falsity against McPhilemy after spending millions of pounds in a nine-week trial before an English jury, and with the added benefit of an English judge, how can the Prentices think they would prevail before a jury in Washington, D.C.?

"The jury in London unanimously rejected the notion that McPhilemy was reckless, but it is that same failed concept that the Prentices have to sell in Washington if they are to win. Their chances of prevailing are between slim and none. And slim just left town."