Jim O'Callaghan plans to reform defamation legislation in aftermath of Gerry Adams's High Court victory
It comes as Gerry Adams was last week awarded €100,000 in damages after being defamed in a BBC documentary and news article.
The jury last week rejected defences put forward by the BBC that the allegation was published in good faith and that it was fair and reasonable to do so.
Section 26 of the Defamation Act 2009 outlines the possible defence of fair and reasonable publication, citing the need for the publication to be in good faith and for the public benefit.
'As our legal team made clear, if the BBC's case cannot be won under existing Irish defamation law, it's hard to see how anyone's could,' said the head of BBC Northern Ireland Adam Smyth, speaking after the jury's decision.
Defamation reforms passed committee stage in the Dáil at the end of April and are being passed 'as a matter of priority'
Eoin O'Dell, a law lecturer in Trinity College Dublin, said that no Section 26 defence has ever succeeded in this country.
He said the Adams case 'shows how limited a defence it is for media'. He said the defence needs to be simplified, as had happened with defamation law in England.
The Department of Justice confirmed that Jim O'Callaghan intends to bring forward an amendment 'to provide for a clearer and simpler defence of fair and reasonable publication in the public interest'.
The Government has also promised to pass defamation law reforms with safeguards against strategic lawsuits against public participation, also known as SLAPP suits.
Defamation reforms passed committee stage in the Dáil at the end of April, and are now being passed 'as a matter of priority', said the spokesperson at the Department.
Sinn Féin sources this weekend said that even though they believe the former party leader's reputation has now been restored, he will not be running in the race for the Áras later this year.
Sinn Féin members have been asked by party headquarters for their ideas on how the party should approach the presidential election.
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5 hours ago
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A doctor ordered him not to travel for eight to 12 weeks due to the risk of blood clots, which, he said, meant he had to stay slightly past 8 December, when his authorisation expired. A flower rests in front of California National Guardsmen during a protest outside the Federal Building on Thursday, June 12, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Wally Skalij) He got paperwork from his physician and contacted the Irish and American embassies and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to seek an extension, but it was short notice and he did not hear back, he said. 'I did everything I could with the online tools available to notify the authorities that this was happening,' he said, explaining that by the time his deadline to leave the US had approached, he was nearly healed and planning to soon return. 'I thought they would understand because I had the correct paperwork. It was just a couple of days for medical reasons.' 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'We were treated less than human.' He and others requested medical visits, but were never seen by physicians, he said: 'I heard people crying for doctors, saying they couldn't breathe, and staff would just say, 'Well, I'm not a doctor,' and walk away.' He did eventually receive the psychiatric medication he requested, but staff would throw his pill under his cell door, and he'd sometimes have to search the floor to find it. Detainees, he said, were given recreation time in an enclosure that was partially open to fresh air, but resembled an indoor cage: 'You couldn't see the outside whatsoever. I didn't see the sky for weeks.' He had sciatica from an earlier hip injury and said he began experiencing 'unbearable' nerve pain as a result of the lack of movement. Thomas said it seemed Ice's placements in BoP were arbitrary and poorly planned. Of the nearly 50 people taken from Ice to BoP, around 30 of them were transferred back to Folkston a week later, and the following week, two from that group were once again returned to BoP, he said. In the BoP Atlanta facility, he said, Ice representatives would show up once a week to talk to detainees. Detainees would crowd around Ice officials and beg for case updates or help. Ice officers spoke Spanish and English, but Middle Eastern and North African detainees who spoke neither were stuck in a state of confusion. 'It was pandemonium,' Thomas said. Thomas said he saw a BoP guard tear up 'watching the desperation of the people trying to talk to Ice and find out what was happening', and that this officer tried to assist people as best as she could. Thomas and Malone tried to help asylum seekers and others he met at BoP by connecting them to advocates. Thomas was also unable to speak to his children, because there was no way to make international calls: 'I don't know how I made it through.' In mid-March, Thomas was briefly transferred again to a different Ice facility. The authorities did not explain what had changed, but two armed federal officers then escorted him on a flight back to Ireland. DHS and Ice did not respond to inquiries, and a spokesperson for Geo Group declined to comment. It seems like a completely incomprehensible, punitive detention — Sirine Shebaya Donald Murphy, a BoP spokesperson, confirmed that Thomas had been in the bureau's custody, but did not comment about his case or conditions at the Atlanta facility. BoP is now housing Ice detainees in eight of its prisons and would 'continue to support our law enforcement partners to fulfil the administration's policy objectives', he added. 'This will be a lifelong burden' It's unclear why Thomas was jailed for so long for a minor immigration violation. 'It seems completely outlandish that they would detain someone for three months because he overstayed a visa for a medical reason,' said Sirine Shebaya, executive director of the National Immigration Project, who is not involved in his case and was told a summary by the Guardian. 'It is such a waste of time and money at a time when we're hearing constantly about how the government wants to cut expenses. It seems like a completely incomprehensible, punitive detention.' Ice, she added, was 'creating its own crisis of overcrowding'. Jennifer Ibañez Whitlock, senior policy counsel with the National Immigration Law Center, also not involved in the case, said in general, it was not uncommon for someone to remain in immigration custody even after they've accepted a removal order and that she has had European clients shocked to learn they can face serious consequences for briefly overstaying a visa. Ice, however, had discretion to release Thomas with an agreement that he'd return home instead of keeping him indefinitely detained, she said. The Trump administration, she added, has defaulted to keeping people detained without weighing individual factors of their cases: 'Now it's just, do we have a bed?' Republican lawmakers in Georgia last year also passed state legislation requiring police to alert immigration authorities when an undocumented person is arrested, which could have played a role in Thomas being flagged to Ice, said Samantha Hamilton, staff attorney with Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Atlanta, a non-profit group that advocates for immigrants' rights. She met Thomas on a legal visit at the BoP Atlanta facility. Residents gather during a community vigil on Monday, June 30, 2025, to stand in solidarity with an immigrant family after ICE agents detained Rosalina Luna Vargas on Saturday, June 28, in front of her children, in Pasadena, Calif. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes) Hamilton said she was particularly concerned about immigrants of colour who are racially profiled and pulled over by police, but Thomas's ordeal was a reminder that so many people are vulnerable: 'The mass detentions are terrifying and it makes me afraid for everyone.' Thomas had previously travelled to the US frequently for work, but now questions if he'll ever be allowed to return: 'This will be a lifelong burden.' Malone, his girlfriend, said she plans to move to Ireland to live with him: 'It's not an option for him to come here and I don't want to be in America anymore.' Since his return, Thomas said he has had a hard time sleeping and processing what happened: 'I'll never forget it, and it'll be a long time before I'll be able to even start to unpack everything I went through. It still doesn't feel real. When I think about it, it's like a movie I'm watching.' He said he has also struggled with long-term health problems that he attributes to malnutrition and inappropriate medications he was given while detained. He was shaken by reports of people sent away without due process: 'I wouldn't have been surprised if I ended up at Guantánamo Bay or El Salvador, because it was so disorganised. I was just at the mercy of the federal government.' - The Guardian
