{"id":369389,"date":"2026-03-28T07:08:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:08:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/369389\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T07:08:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:08:14","slug":"court-dismisses-gemma-odohertys-bid-for-strikeout-of-defamation-case-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/369389\/","title":{"rendered":"Court dismisses Gemma O\u2019Doherty\u2019s bid for strikeout of defamation case \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Litigants should inform their opponents and the court if they have used artificial intelligence<\/a> (AI) to prepare their legal papers, the Court of Appeal said as it dismissed an appeal by journalist and activist Gemma O\u2019Doherty<\/a> citing authorities that \u201csimply did not exist\u201d.<\/p>\n

Judge Caroline Costello, writing for the three-judge court, said O\u2019Doherty, who did not have lawyers representing her, used AI to prepare her written submissions that included \u201challucinations\u201d of non-existent cases.<\/p>\n

This is an \u201cinherent and well-known risk\u201d of using AI to write legal papers, the judge said, adding that parties are obliged not to mislead the court by advancing \u201cfake\u201d propositions that have no legal basis.<\/p>\n

She said she does not believe O\u2019Doherty intended to mislead the court or was aware she was citing fictional cases. The judge noted there was then no guidance to help self-representing litigants know how they should and should not use AI in their cases.<\/p>\n

Setting out a short set of principles on AI, the judge said litigants may use it responsibly to assist with research and should independently verify the accuracy of their submissions.<\/p>\n

It is \u201cnot acceptable\u201d for parties to rely on cases they have not verified, and judges will be able to apply sanctions where AI leads to the court being misled.<\/p>\n

Costello made the comments as she rejected O\u2019Doherty\u2019s appeal against the High Court\u2019s refusal to strike out defamation proceedings brought against her by Jimmy Guerin, a councillor and brother of murdered journalist Veronica Guerin. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Doherty sought a strikeout in December 2024, about a year after a jury failed to reach a verdict in the case following a five-day trial. Refusing her application, the High Court ordered a retrial, which has not yet occurred.<\/p>\n

Guerin claims O\u2019Doherty, a former Irish Independent journalist, defamed him in social media posts and a website video from 2019 that, he alleges, conveyed he was a convicted paedophile. <\/p>\n

Posts by her said \u201cpaedophile brother of Veronica Guerin, murdered with the involvement of Garda\u201d had been found guilty of possession of hundreds of child sexual abuse images. <\/p>\n

It was in fact Guerin\u2019s brother, Martin Guerin, who pleaded guilty in 2019 to possession of hundreds of images and 146 video files of child sexual abuse material.<\/p>\n

Jimmy Guerin claimed the words published were understood to refer to him. O\u2019Doherty said her words were clearly intended and understood to refer to Martin Guerin.<\/p>\n

In seeking a strikeout of the case, O\u2019Doherty alleged it was \u201cmalicious, vexatious, frivolous, based on fraud, perjury and deception\u201d, a \u201cgrave attack on press freedom\u201d and \u201cbound to fail\u201d. She has also brought a counterclaim for alleged defamation.<\/p>\n

In her appeal she alleged, among other points, that the trial judge was objectively biased and her postings from July 2019 were made in the public interest and are protected by \u201cabsolute privilege\u201d.<\/p>\n

In her judgment for the Court of Appeal, delivered this week, Costello said O\u2019Doherty needed to prove Guerin\u2019s case disclosed no cause of action, was an abuse of process or bound to fail. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt is not about \u2018silencing\u2019 the defendant or any journalist. Any person, including journalists, may properly be sued in defamation,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n

Costello found nothing in Guerin\u2019s case amounted to an abuse of process. The High Court was correct to conclude O\u2019Doherty had \u201cfallen well short\u201d of establishing the claim was an abuse of process. <\/p>\n

She said the case \u201cundoubtedly\u201d discloses a reasonable cause of action, while O\u2019Doherty failed to provide a basis for suggesting the trial judge was objectively biased. <\/p>\n

Costello, supported by her colleagues Donald Binchy and Brian O\u2019Moore, dismissed all eight grounds of appeal. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Litigants should inform their opponents and the court if they have used artificial intelligence (AI) to prepare their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369390,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[218,72,10202,166026,73,61,60],"class_list":["post-369389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-business","tag-court-of-appeal","tag-gemma-odoherty","tag-high-court","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}