The High Court was told yesterday that the Sunday Mirror newspaper had got the wrong man when it reported that the 1984 Brighton bomber, Mr Patrick Magee, had threatened to kill the Sinn Féin president, Mr Gerry Adams, for allegedly "surrendering" to the peace process.
Mr Martin Giblin SC, for Mr Magee, said his client was never in Belmarsh Prison as alleged by the newspaper, although, he added, there was a different Magee in that prison.
He was opposing an application by MGN Ltd, publisher of the Sunday Mirror, to strike out an intended libel action being brought against it by Mr Magee (51), a native of Belfast, who has an address at Ballyrickard, Tralee, Co Kerry. Mr Justice McKechnie reserved judgment.
Mr Maurice Collins, for MGN Ltd, said a large bomb exploded on October 12th, 1984, at the Grand Hotel in Brighton, where the Tory Party conference was taking place. It was planted by the IRA and, specifically, by Mr Magee. Five people were killed and a large number injured.
In June 1986 Mr Magee received eight life sentences. He was released in June 1999 under the Belfast Agreement.
A month after his release, the Sunday Mirror published an article referring to Mr Magee.
It asserted that documents, arising from intelligence reports made while Mr Magee was a prisoner in Belmarsh Prison, disclosed that he had threatened to kill Mr Adams; that he was an opponent of the peace process; opposed cessation of the IRA's campaign of violence; and opposed decommissioning.
Mr Collins said the Sunday Mirror was applying to have Mr Magee's intended action struck out on the basis that it was doomed to failure because it was not disputed that he was convicted and guilty of multiple murders in the cause of a terrorist campaign by the IRA.
Mr Collins submitted that the gravest imputation relied on by Mr Magee appeared to be that he had threatened to kill or injure Mr Adams. Even accepting that the words in the report bore that meaning and were untrue, his clients submitted that no right-thinking jury could find the words defamed Mr Magee.
Such a finding would necessarily involve a finding that the life of Mr Adams was, in some sense, worth more than the lives of the five persons murdered by Mr Magee in 1984.
Mr Giblin said his client was never in Belmarsh Prison, and it appeared there had been another Magee in that prison. MGN was seeking to establish that his client was a man with a reputation for violence who would never be capable of anything else.
Mr Magee was now a man of peace and a vigorous and enthusiastic supporter of those who were involved in the peace process. That claim had not been disputed by MGN.
Mr Giblin said his client should not be deprived of the opportunity of saying: "Yes, I was convicted of violence in the past, but I am now a supporter of peace."