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Ian Bailey was arrested in Dublin on Monday after the High Court endorsed a warrant for his extradition to France in connection with the murder of a French film producer in west Cork 22 years ago.

Mr Bailey, who was in court, is expected to be released on bail pending a full hearing of the extradition proceedings.

This was the third warrant seeking the arrest of Mr Bailey and his extradition to France for the murder of film-maker Sophie Toscan du Plantier, which he denies.

Mr Justice Donald Binchy on Monday afternoon endorsed the latest warrant, which marks the third time that French authorities have sought Mr Bailey’s surrender in relation to the death of Ms du Plantier, who was found dead outside her holiday home in Schull in west Cork in December 1996.

Extradition proceedings could not begin until the High Court endorsed the French warrant.

Mr Bailey, with an address at The Prairie, Liscaha, Schull, west Cork, was convicted of the Frenchwoman’s murder in his absence in a Paris court earlier this year. The three-judge Cour d’Assises in Paris accordingly imposed a 25-year prison sentence on him in his absence.

The 62-year-old Englishman denies any involvement in the mother-of-one’s death. He did not attend the French court and had no legal representation in the proceedings, which he has described as a “farce”. – Additional reporting Reuters

irishtimes.com

Woman claims glass jug smashed after hot water poured into it for tea

A woman has sued after claiming a glass jug she bought in Dunnes Stores exploded and shattered after she poured hot water from a kettle into it.

Eva Cekanova, who is from Slovakia, told the court in her home country tea is made in a big glass jug.

She said she boiled a kettle in her Dublin apartment and let it sit for a few minutes before pouring the hot water, which was at a temperature of between 80 to 90 degrees, on top of a watermelon teabag in the tall jug.

“I was just making tea like I did a million times before and it never happened,” she said.

“The water was not boiling.”

The tall jug shattered into pieces and she fell back so that the liquid hit her thigh, knee and legs and she suffered burns which left her with scarring, she said.

Dunnes Stores has contended the glass jug was intended for cold drinks like juice or cordial and not for hot liquid.

Ms Cekanova (30), of Windmill Terrace, Clonsilla, Dublin, has sued Dunnes Stores over the accident with the jug, which she bought at the Blanchardstown Shopping Centre, Dublin, on December 5, 2015.

Dunnes denies all claims and that the incident occurred as alleged.

It contends Ms Cekanova failed to heed a warning sticker on the jug, on which Dunnes says specifically not to use hot water.

Cross-examined by Dunnes counsel Marcus Daly SC, Ms Cekanova said she had “never before in my life” heard of putting something metal like a spoon in to glass when pouring hot liquid in to it.

Counsel put it to her the accident was her own fault.

She asked why there was a warning label on some jugs and not others.

“If I was warned I would not have put hot water and there was no sticker on the jug,” she said.

Her husband Marcin said after the jug shattered, his wife was screaming and he took her to the bathroom where he put cold water on her legs. She later got medical treatment.

Mr Justice Kevin Cross will give his judgment today.

Irish Independent

Couple lose €75,000 claim against restaurant for being asked to pay bill

A couple who claimed they had been defamed by staff who asked them to pay a dinner bill at a pub-restaurant have lost a €75,000 claim but escaped having to pay defence legal costs.

Judge John O’Connor, dismissing the claim by Glen McCarthy and Joanna Walsh, said in the Circuit Civil court he had found Mr McCarthy’s evidence to have been very argumentative.

The judge said it was probably Mr McCarthy’s argumentative attitude in the Harbourmaster Bar and Restaurant close to Dublin’s Irish Financial Services Centre on the evening of January 4 last year that had led to the proceedings having been taken.

Barrister Matthew Gahan told the court the Harbourmaster was denying there had been any defamation of either or both of the two plaintiffs and had entered a full defence to the single defamatory claim by both.

Mr Gahan said the couple had left the restaurant without having settled their bill and had been approached for payment in the restaurant’s smoking area.

Judge O’Connor had heard from Ms Walsh, of Island Quay, East Road, Dublin 3, and her partner, Mr McCarthy, of Constitution Hill, Dublin 7, of their humiliation at having been asked to pay the bill.

They had come back inside after settling their bill with a €19 voucher and €11 in cash. The duty manager Michael Brennan had spent 15 minutes with them explaining house policy regarding payment for meals.

Mr Brennan told Mr Gahan that when they had asked for the manager he had met them and had spoken with the couple in a low voice and had dealt with the matter sensitively.

He explained that after having been “burnt” on a number of occasions by customers having left the restaurant before settling their bills, they had introduced a policy whereby staff would ask for payment.

Mr McCarthy said they had left belongings such as coats at the table while they had gone outside to the smoking area for a cigarette. He said they had been out for no more than five minutes. The waitress had asked for payment in front of other customers.

Judge O’Connor said the couple had taken umbrage at this and had claimed this had been defamatory. Mr Brennan had sat down with them and had tried to explain matters.

“Quite frankly, asking someone to pay for a meal isn’t defamatory and by no stretch of the imagination is there any evidence that they were defamed,” the judge said.

Irish Independent

Boy (12) who broke arm travelling up escalator awarded €35k

A 12-year-old schoolboy, who broke his left arm while travelling upwards on an escalator in Dunnes St Stephens Green store, was awarded €35,000 in the Circuit Civil Court today.

Barrister Conor Kearney told Judge John O’Connor that Dunnes had initially refused to accept an Injuries Board assessment of €35,000 and the company had entered a full defence to the claim.

Mr Kearney, who appeared with Keith Walsh Solicitors for Mason Sarsfield and his mother Sarah Sarsfield, through whom he brought his claim, said that following an inspection by a forensic engineer, the store had now accepted the figure and was agreeing to the settlement assessment of €35,000.

He said Mason, who was seven at the time of the August 2014 accident, had been ahead of his mother at the time and no-one had actually witnessed the exact cause of the injury. As a result of the engineers report and two sets of discovery proceedings the claim was eventually resolved.

Mr Kearney said Mason, of Aughavannagh Road, Crumlin, Dublin 12 had been taken to Crumlin Children’s Hospital where his fracture had been manipulated under general anaesthetic and a plaster had been fitted which he had to wear for five weeks.

He told the court that medical reports revealed Mason had made a full recovery with no suspected risk of developing arthritis.

Judge O’Connor said he considered the settlement a good one and approved the offer. Exactly a month before Christmas 2025, Mason will be able to withdraw the €35.000 with gained courts interest as he reaches his 18th birthday.

Irish Independent

‘I’m so proud, I can walk, talk and dance’ – boy with cerebral palsy gets €3.6m

A seven-year-old boy with cerebral palsy has secured an interim €3.6m payment under a settlement of his action over the circumstances of his birth at Cork University Maternity Hospital (CUMH).

Outside court, Iarlaith Ó Cinnéide, who the High Court heard has received an advanced form of physiotherapy, smiled as he told journalists: “I’m so proud of my progress, I can walk and talk and eat and dance.”

The €3.6m payment is for his care needs over the next five years after which the matter will return to court.

The child has disabilities including a spastic gait but is attending school and has good intellectual ability and insight. He had asked his parents whether the settlement of the case “will mean I won’t have cerebral palsy any more”.

Liam Reidy SC, instructed by Cantillons Solicitors, for the child, secured approval of the settlement, made against the HSE, from Mr Justice Kevin Cross. An earlier €250,000 payment from the State Claims Agency is included.

Counsel outlined the child was born at CUMH on April 3, 2012, and the case arose from a brain injury suffered during the course of birth and the second stage of labour and thereafter.

Liability and causation were eventually admitted on June 27, 2018, he said.

The core claims of negligence included an obstetric consultant should have been called prior to Iarlaith’s birth at 10.40am after a CTG trace indicated issues at about 10am. Their case was, had that been done, early intervention would have happened and the child would not have suffered a brain injury, counsel said. Other claims included there was “substandard” monitoring of the foetal heart rate and that, at one time the CTG was monitoring the mother’s heart rate rather than the foetal rate.

Iarlaith’s mother Deborah Ui Chinnéide told the judge of her efforts to establish what had happened to the child during labour and up to his birth, ultimately leading to an external review.

Despite criticisms in that review of what happened, a defence denying liability was provided the same month and liability was admitted only a year later, she said. She agreed, after birth, the child received “amazing” care from the hospital’s neonatal team which may have saved his life.

Iarlaith is a “tenacious, very gregarious and loving” child and gets great support from his brothers, Somahirle and Tadhg, she said.

The family have concerns whether the advanced physiotherapy Iarlaith had received will continue as only one person here provides it and she may be retiring soon, she added. The physiotherapist is Vera Bohner-Martin, HSE senior paediatric physiotherapist in north Cork.

Approving the settlement, Mr Justice Cross praised the family who had “turned up trumps” for Iarlaith who has made “extraordinary strides”. Through his mother, Iarlaith, of Templenoe, Fermoy, Co Cork, sued the HSE over the circumstances of his birth.

In a statement outside court, Fiachra Ó Cinnéide said the settlement marked “the end of a long struggle in getting justice for our son Iarlaith”.

“Unfortunately, it took six years, and a court case, for the HSE to admit liability. We have yet to receive an apology.”

Irish Independent

The Special Criminal Court had a 94 per cent conviction rate at trial last year, but the rate could be reduced in future following the acquittal of two men last week.

According to a data analysis by The Irish Times, since 2016, 89 per cent of trials at that court have ended in convictions.

By comparison, trials in the Circuit Court had a 48 per cent conviction, while 54 per cent ended in guilty verdicts in the Central Criminal Court.

“You don’t walk free from the Special Criminal Court” is a phrase repeated so often by members of the Law Library that it has almost become a mantra.

As a statement of fact, it’s not quite true but it’s close enough. The non-jury court is known by some as the “potting shed” for good reason (“potting” being lawyer slang for convicting).

There are several reasons for the disparity, including the fact the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) doesn’t bring cases before the Special Criminal Court unless they are very confident of conviction.

Secret evidence
The conviction rate is also helped by a toolbox of extraordinary powers available to the DPP which wouldn’t fly in any other court. This includes the right to rely on what is effectively secret evidence when prosecuting the offence of membership of unlawful organisations.

That right was struck something of a blow last week with the acquittal of two men – Laurence Murphy and Ray Kennedy – accused of IRA membership. It was a decision which could have serious consequences for future membership prosecutions.

In membership cases, the court can rely on the opinion of a chief superintendent that someone is part of an illegal group.

When asked by the defence what evidence this opinion is based on, the Special Detective Unit (SDU) of the Garda inevitably claims privilege over the information on the basis that divulging it may pose a risk to life or future operations.

For a long time, the judges of the Special Criminal Court accepted the Garda’s secrecy with little questioning. That changed during the recent trial when Ms Justice Tara Burns ordered that if the Garda weren’t going to disclose the evidence to the defence, they should at least give it to the prosecution.

Rare acquittal
In response, the Garda simply refused to hand it over, citing safety concerns. This meant the DPP had to go back before the court and say it couldn’t comply with the judge’s order.

On Thursday, the extraordinary sequence of events led to that rarest of sights in the Special: an acquittal. The court ruled the chief superintendent’s evidence was inadmissible because the “blanket” privilege claimed over the underlying evidence created “an unfairness”.

It is believed to be the first time the Special has ruled “belief evidence” to be inadmissible.

What is remarkable is the Garda and DPP maintained their positions even as it became clear it would be fatal to their case.

It wasn’t the only flaw in the case. The court questioned if the chief superintendent was experienced enough to give belief evidence. It also raised concerns that certain statements by a State witness which could have benefited the accused were not disclosed to the defence.

The ruling will not have any immediate consequences, partly because there are only two membership cases in the pipeline and neither is due for hearing in the short term.

It also will not form precedent. However, this could change if the DPP decides to appeal the decision. If an appeal court upholds the Special Criminal Court’s approach, it could throw a major spanner in the works of the SDU and its secretive methods.

Conviction rates in Special, Central and Circuit Criminal Courts: cases that went to trial (excluding disagreements)

2018

• SCC: 94 per cent
• Circuit: 38 per cent
• Central: 62 per cent

2017

• SCC: 79 per cent
• Circuit: 50 per cent
• Central: 54 per cent

2016

• SCC: 95 per cent
• Circuit: 57 per cent
• Central: 47 per cent

2015

• SCC: 20 per cent
• Circuit: 57 per cent
• Central: 70 per cent

2014

• SCC: 85 per cent
• Circuit: 51 per cent
• Central: 69 per cent

irishtimes.com

Up to 12 content moderators are preparing to take legal action against Facebook in Ireland, The Irish Times has learned.

The first case was initiated in the High Court on Wednesday by a former moderator, Chris Gray. He is suing Facebook Ireland and CPL Solutions for psychological injuries he claims he suffered as a result of his work, which involved “repeated and unrelenting exposure to extremely disturbing, graphic and violent content”.

The 53-year-old claims that moderating content including videos of executions, lethal beatings, child exploitation and animal cruelty, left him argumentative, over-sensitive and at times aggressive. Further cases are expected to follow, including more than one by a direct employee of Facebook.

“I expect this to snowball,” said Cori Crider, director of Foxglove, a UK-based not-for-profit group working with lawyers for other would-be plaintiffs.

“We think that it is high time that we cleaned up social media’s factory floor.”

Facebook said in a statement that it is “committed to providing support for those that review content for Facebook as we recognise that reviewing certain types of content can sometimes be difficult”. Moderators go through “an in-depth, multi-week training programme on our Community Standards” and have access to “extensive psychological support”.

CPL was not available for comment, but it previously said it provides employees with extensive training, cares “deeply” about them and takes “any concerns they raise very seriously”.

irishtimes.com

Court Service says it will not publish Edmund Honohan rulings because he is not a judge

The Master of the High Court, Edmund Honohan, has complained that the Courts Service will not publish his rulings because it says “there is no room on their website”.

Mr Honohan occupies a quasijudicial role and is responsible for dealing with certain pretrial applications in High Court proceedings. He sometimes publishes extensive written rulings in his cases but, unlike judgments from the superior courts, these are not available on the service’s website.

The service has also stopped supplying physical copies to the Law Library in the Four Courts.

Mr Honohan raised the issue at a hearing last week before reading out a ruling he had made in a case concerning Allied Irish Banks.

In his decision, he ordered that a full hearing take place instead of one based solely on sworn affidavits because he had concerns the High Court “will not follow the law as set out by the Supreme Court” in relation to issues arising.

He brought a stack of copies of the ruling to court which was described by one lawyer as being “2ft high”.

Mr Honohan said he had asked the service why it did not publish his ruling alongside the written judgments from other courts and was told it did not have room on its website.

A spokesman for the service said it only published judgments that come from judges and that “quasijudicial officials are not judges” and their rulings were not published because they “have no binding or persuasive weight or authority”.

‘Misunderstanding’
“To publish them might lead to a misunderstanding, particularly on the part of non lawyers, that they carry such authority when they do not,” he said, adding that decisions of other similar officials such as county registrars were not published either.

A spokeswoman for the Law Library said the service was the “sole publisher of the Master’s rulings” and that since the service stopped publishing them it no longer had a means of acquiring them.

Mr Honohan has clashed with the High Court judges on several occasions in the past over his jurisdiction to strike out cases.

President of the High Court Peter Kelly removed all debt cases from the Master’s court earlier this year, provoking criticism from supporters of Mr Honohan who see him as a strong supporter of debtors’ rights. Mr Honohan did not respond to attempts to contact him for comment.

irishtimes.com

The problem with the narrative that says a “compo culture” has caused a recent surge in insurance premiums is that it is a ball of smoke fuelled by prejudice and innuendo. It is the insurance industry’s gift to modern shaming culture.

This dodgy, decrepit, deceitful narrative is propagated by vested interests and appears to be a stranger to the facts. Yet for some odd reason, wider society, including many of us who should know better, can’t get enough of it. Ravenously, we swallow it down, bones and all, begging for more. More lies.

It is simply not true that a growing number of grubby chancers on the make is the cause of the steep spike in premiums in recent years, putting innocent SMEs out of business. Virtually every reliable statistic shows that to be rubbish.

Yet the industry keeps braying that rapacious claimants are the cause of all insurance ills for butchers, bakers and merriment makers. It is the ultimate exaggerated claim. Observers who care about the facts ought to push back against it. Repeating a lie often enough does not make it the truth.

Acceptance of the “compo culture” narrative implies a few possibilities: that the numbers of claims is increasing due to fraudulent reports, that this has led to a spike in awards thus driving up costs, and that award levels are too high.

The first two are demonstrably untrue. Official data from the Courts Service shows that the overall number of personal injury claims filed in court in 2018 fell 1.6 per cent to 22,049. If false claimants were feasting on the system, that number would surely be rising. If insurers are settling claims they believe to be fraudulent then the industry needs an overhaul and has itself to blame.

District court filings, dealing with claims of up to €15,000, were down 2.4 per cent. Circuit court personal injury claims of up to €60,000 – encompassing the sweet spot for many motor claims – were down 4.3 per cent. The number of High Court cases was statistically flat.

Excluding medical negligence awards, which were down a total of 7.5 per cent, the amount awarded in other personal injury claims in the High Court was down by a fifth in total, or an average of 23 per cent in each case. The total burden on the insurance industry of personal injury claims has barely risen at all since 2013.

The last straw usually grasped at by the “compo culture” crowd is the fact that whiplash awards here are, at just above €20,000, about four times the UK level. Those figures are effectively set by judges, not the public.

Is the Irish legal system too generous? Or is the UK system too tight, awarding just an average of one month’s gross salary for a middle ranking worker as compensation for painful soft tissue damage inflicted on the neck and shoulders? Who knows. But we do know that the available data is flimsy evidence of a supposedly widespread culture of fraud among the public.

Doherty’s skewering
Even if you ignore the clear evidence of the court data, you cannot ignore Sinn Féin TD Pearse Doherty’s now legendary skewering of a hapless cadre of insurance industry chief executives at an Oireachtas committee meeting in July.

They each rolled up to claim, with straight faces, that about 20 per cent of all claims are “fraudulent”. Applying that metric across the industry, there must be close to 5,000 dodgy claims a year among cases that get to court alone, and perhaps eight times that number across all cases taken annually.

Yet how many suspected frauds did the industry report to guards in a six-month period until March this year? A paltry 19 in total. The “compo culture” emperor is stark blooming naked, and hasn’t worn a stitch in years. The chief executives’ Oireachtas committee performance was a grand slur against the honesty of a huge swathe of the public.

So with all this evidence to the contrary, why do we still humour this nonsense about a widespread compo culture as the cause of the recent premium rises, thus conveniently (for the industry) deflecting blame from the real reasons? Why do we listen to the egregious anecdotes of fraudulent behaviour trotted out by business owners or a recalcitrant insurance industry, and accept them as empirical evidence of something more widespread?

Many people accept the narrative because it feeds their prejudices about those whom they imagine to be responsible for most of the dodgy claims: the working classes. It’s baked into the lingo. “Compo” is earthy slang, deliberately evocative of how a certain type of person thinks people “below” them sound. Say the word “compo” out loud. You’re speaking in a working class accent.

It plays into notions about greasy proles – chancers – out to pull a stroke. You often hear a similar tenor in debates about social welfare fraud. The argument is laced with shaming and judgement, and is meant to douse the legitimacy of all personal injury claims. Its intention is to make it a shameful act to seek compensation for injury, because your neighbours must pay for your “compo”.

Journalists, too, must be wary of using the industry’s loaded language in the “compo culture” debate. When we do, we are not being impartial.

Some claimants are indeed on the make, as they are in all types of civil claims, including defamation and a large number of commercial disputes. But the majority are not. That remains a fact until the industry proves otherwise. Fraudulent claiming appears to be more widespread than it actually is because we choose to give such oxygen to egregious examples.

Insurance companies have sold us a pup on compo culture. Litigation is adversarial. Genuine claimants are not morally obliged to be restrained or thrifty. They are engaged in legal battles. The fight is on until one side vanquishes the other, so fight hard.

In addition to a personal injuries commission, there should be a separate commission of inquiry into the insurance industry’s wider practices, including its pricing, its ethics and its corporate excesses. Then we will see where the real exaggeration lies, and just who is perpetrating a fraud on people’s trust.

irishtimes.com

Woman loses defamation case over Red Bull ‘shoplift’ claim

A woman’s defamation action over her claim she had been accused of shoplifting a can of Red Bull has been dismissed by the High Court.

Winnie O’Donnell (54), of Tor An Rí Lane, Balgaddy, Lucan, Co Dublin, sued Musgrave Ireland, operators of a Centra Store at Griffeen Way, Lucan.

Her relative Winnie Reilly, of the same address, also sued for defamation over the same alleged incident on October 6, 2017, but that case was later withdrawn.

The court heard the pair went into the shop drinking cans of Red Bull which they had bought elsewhere.

When Ms O’Donnell got to the checkout with items she wanted to buy, she claimed an assistant manager went over to the security man and had a brief conversation.

When the assistant returned, Ms O’Donnell said she asked her: “Did you just accuse me of stealing this Red Bull?” She said the assistant replied: “‘Yeh’, and she had a smirk on.”

Mr Justice Tony O’Connor said there was no evidence she was accused of shoplifting.

Irish Independent