The High Court struck out Dana Rosemary Scallon’s proceedings against Independent News and Media plc after finding it was not the publisher of the publications at issue. The court refused her application to add three publishing companies as defendants, ruling that the proposed claims could not proceed in the form sought.
The case concerned publications on 10 and 11 July 2014. Scallon had first sued Sunday Newspapers Ltd. in Northern Ireland in June 2015. She began these Irish proceedings in July 2015 against Independent News and Media plc, which the judgment described as the parent company of the publishers.
The Irish defendant told Scallon’s solicitors in March 2016 that it was the wrong defendant, while time remained to correct the mistake. The court said the solicitors did not change course. Scallon later delivered a second statement of claim without seeking required leave to amend. The Northern Irish proceedings settled with an apology in November 2018.
The defendant applied to strike out the Irish case. Scallon sought to add Independent Newspapers (Ireland) Ltd., Sunday Newspapers Ltd. and Independent News and Media Ltd. The judge found the publications identified those companies as publishers and there was no evidence that the existing defendant itself published the material or was involved in its day-to-day publication.
The court held that the two-year limitation period for defamation had expired, so claims against the proposed defendants were time-barred. It also found no affidavit evidence supporting a claim of malice for malicious falsehood; held that loss of reputation was not a separate tort; and rejected the constitutional-rights claim in the circumstances. The privacy claim, which the judgment said concerned a photograph taken in a public place, was not supported by an adequate averment and could not be used to obtain the same result as the barred defamation claim.
On 8 July 2020, the court refused the motion to add defendants and struck out the proceedings in their entirety as bound to fail. The judge said the outcome did not alter the acceptance that the statements complained of were “totally erroneous.”
In a costs decision dated 24 July 2020, the court awarded the defendant the costs of the proceedings, subject to existing interlocutory costs orders in Scallon’s favour, which could be set off. The question of whether to make a separate order against her solicitor under Order 99, rule 9 was adjourned generally with liberty to re-enter.