Jury to consider whether hotelier was defamed

A jury will today consider its verdict in a High Court action for damages by an elderly Waterford city hotelier over a Sunday World article which, he claims, meant he was a brothel-keeper.

Closing speeches in the action by Vincent O'Toole (80), owner of the 22-bedroom Maryland Hotel at The Mall, Waterford, concluded yesterday, and today Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne will charge the jury before sending them to consider their verdict.

Closing the case for Mr O'Toole, John Gordon SC said the article was "salacious", printed beside a picture of a "nubile young lady" intended to engage the reader. This was "a smart-alec title" for a "smart-alec article" and was a "lousy" thing to do to his client. There was only one Maryland Hotel in Waterford, the premises operated by Mr O'Toole, and the only thing a reasonable reader could take from the article was that there was a little hotel in Waterford called the Maryland which was a brothel, counsel said. "What worse thing could you say about anybody's premises?"

The jury was entitled to note the newspaper had not called any evidence in the case, counsel said. Why should Mr O'Toole, a decent man in his old age, be put through the wringer like this by a newspaper that casually decided not to call a witness, he asked.

The case had been dogged since August 2004 by the fact the Sunday World had consistently refused to do the honourable thing and take responsibility for what had happened, said Mr Gordon. On the one hand, it had offered a conditional apology and, on the other, insisted it had not defamed Mr O'Toole. Later, in 2004, it had suggested the name "Maryland" was synonymous with "brothel" in Waterford, that they had checked that with two sources and that Mr O'Toole must have known this and had been foolish to call his hotel the Maryland.

This was an aggressive and insulting position to take, especially where the newspaper had not since attempted to stand over any of that, counsel said. Now it was accepting without reservation that Maryland was not and never had been understood to be slang in Waterford for a brothel.

The most elementary of checks carried out prior to publication would have established such a suggestion was complete rubbish, counsel said.

Eoin McCullough SC, for the Sunday World, said the jury should conclude a reasonable reader would regard the article as "a joke" and "a spoof" not intended to be taken seriously, even if they didn't consider it was in good taste. Any reasonable person who knew Mr O'Toole - who was not named in the article - could not think the article seriously meant he was a brothel-keeper, counsel said.

However, even if the jury took that view, they should only award a sum of damages which was "very small indeed", counsel said. This was because Mr O'Toole had said the case was about vindicating his good name - and correspondence between solicitors showed that, from the very beginning, the Sunday World was willing to apologise to Mr O'Toole. It had suggested various forms of apology and asked Mr O'Toole to forward his own proposed apology. When he did not do so, the newspaper had printed a unilateral apology.

The newspaper also accepted Mr O'Toole is a person of the utmost respectability and probity who had himself said he was so conservative as to be boring, counsel added.

He was not suggesting the jury should not have sympathy for Mr O'Toole, who clearly took a dim view of the matter. However, there was no evidence the article had damaged his hotel's business.