Former Sinn Fein Leader Gerry Adams Wins Libel Suit Against BBC

Former Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams won his libel suit against the BBC on Friday over a claim he authorized the killing of an informant.

A jury at the High Court in Dublin ruled in Adams’ favor and he was awarded 100,000 euros ($113,000) in damages.

Adams sued Britain’s public broadcaster over a claim in a documentary and online article that he sanctioned the killing of Denis Donaldson, a long-serving Sinn Fein official who acknowledged in 2005 that he had worked for British intelligence. He was shot dead at his cottage in rural Ireland four months later.

In the BBC program broadcast in September 2016, an anonymous source claimed the shooting was sanctioned by the political and military leadership of the IRA and that Adams gave “the final say.”

Adams denies involvement and called the allegation a “grievous smear.”

Adams, 76, is one of the most influential figures of Northern Ireland’s decades of conflict, and its peace process. He led the IRA-linked party Sinn Fein between 1983 and 2018. He has always denied being an IRA member, though former colleagues have said he was one of its leaders.

In 2009, a splinter group opposed to Northern Ireland’s peace agreement, the Real IRA, claimed responsibility for killing Donaldson. An Irish police investigation remains ongoing.