A guesthouse owner has brought a High Court action alleging defamation in a Nob Nation sketch broadcast on RTÉ's 2FM, which described his premises as a "byword in Waterford for prostitution".
Counsel for Vincent O’Toole (84), who owns the Maryland House, the Mall, Waterford city, told a jury today his client is a “leading light” in the Waterford community and the broadcast was “obnoxious” and “untrue”.
Before the five minute sketch was played in court, John Gordon SC told the jurors they would probably find themselves “wincing” because it was the “most vulgar type of broadcast imaginable”.
In evidence, Mr O’Toole said he was “thunderstruck” and “disgusted” by the broadcast and could not understand why anybody could sink to such a low level. “That is the way the media is going these days,” he said. “They are out of control”.
He said he was a pensioner on €300 a week and felt there was no chance of getting his business going. A man who wanted a room believed his premises was a brothel and wanted to know “the price”, he said.
Mr O’Toole also said he could not understand RTÉ’s response to his complaints. An apology offered by RTÉ would not be offered to an imbecile and at the same time they kept repeating the libel to the world, he said.
“That part of RTÉ is gone rotten,” he said.
Mr O'Toole has brought the action arising from an episode of Nob Nation broadcast on the Gerry Ryan Show on 2FM in August 2008. The court heard he previously successfully sued the Sunday World over a similar claim and was awarded €50,000 damages.
It is alleged the words used in the sketch suggested he was a brothel keeper, engaged in prostitution, his home was the haunt of undesirables, and he was or is involved in racketeering.
Opening the case before Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne and the jury, Mr Gordon said Mr O’Toole was a prominent citizen of Waterford city, a “leading light” in the local chamber of commerce and owner of the Maryland, which was trading as an hotel until ten years ago but since then had operated as a guest house.
Mr O'Toole was extremely distressed and deeply frustrated by the Nob Nation broadcast, counsel said. RTÉ had published programme standards and guidelines in June 2008 but was "in complete dereliction" of those standards when they broadcast the Nob Nation sketch, heard by more than 200,000 people.
The piece was embarrassingly vulgar and obnoxious and untrue as it referred to Mr O’Toole’s premises, counsel said.
The sketch featured “Kevin My-arse” giving a Linguaphone guide to Waterford slang. It stated: “The Maryland is a byword in Waterford for prostitution although the original establishment has ceased trading”.
Mr Gordon said Mr O'Toole had spent several years fighting for the reputation of his guesthouse against the Sunday World.
However, 18 months after a “happy conclusion” to those proceedings, RTÉ had graphically reasserted that the premises was a brothel in this extraordinarily coarse broadcast. At the end of the piece, the late Gerry Ryan had encouraged listeners to listen to it “again and again and again” on their computers, counsel said. The appetite for “cheap, ugly radio” seemed insatiable.
Mr O’Toole was entitled to be compensated appropriately for this “never ending libel” and to punitive damages arising from the manner in which RTÉ dealt with the broadcast, counsel said. This was a sketch that fell into “the unforgiveable trap” of rubbishing a person’s reputation.
It must be possible to write a hilarious sketch without doing so at the expense of someone else, he added. “You would think RTÉ would be good at that but apparently not.”
RTÉ had offered a “rather mean apology” and the libel remained on the RTÉ pod cast until March 2010, one and a half years after the original broadcast, and also went on Google and on YouTube where it could still be found.
RTÉ was admitting they had defamed his client but that admission was hedged in ifs and buts, Mr Gordon said. They were not admitting they had an audience beyond the jurisdiction which was “nonsense”.
The court heard RTÉ denies Mr O’Toole had been brought into public scandal, odium or contempt and pleads its publication had caused limited emotional damage to Mr O’Toole and limited damage to his reputation.
RTÉ also denies refusing to make any adequate apology and pleads, in a letter dated September 17th 2008, it wrote to Mr O’Toole’s solicitors enclosing an apology it was willing to broadcast at an agreed time and date but this offer was refused by Mr O‘Toole.
The case continues tomorrow.