TV presenter and comedian Ruby Wax apologised, through her legal team, in court yesterday and agreed to pay undisclosed damages to a Dublin journalist for defamation.
Wax, along with Justin Green and his MCD Management Service.ie Ltd, Dún Laoghaire, were alleged to have called UTV reporter Patricia Danaher "racist" and "anti-Semitic". The defendants were alleged to have told others that Ms Danaher, of Wellington Road, Ballsbridge, Dublin, had called Wax a "Jew" and that Ms Danaher had been "rude, offensive, aggressive, provocative and insulting" towards Wax in an interview in June 2000.
Wax was alleged to have said: "I have never been so insulted in my life. Who let that bitch in?" She did not appear in court.
Mr Paul Gardiner SC said that on behalf of all defendants he apologised unreservedly for comments made to senior UTV personnel concerning Ms Danaher. "They accept that Ms Danaher acted properly and professionally in every respect in the course of her interview with Ms Wax and thereafter," he said.