Defamation case against former Law Society President unable to go ahead as judge falls ill

A three-day trial, in which a Carrick-on-Suir accountant is suing the former President of the Law Society and her fellow solicitor husband for €50,000 for defamation of character, was unable to go ahead today (Monday, December 11) due to a judge having fallen ill.

Judge Sarah Berkeley, who was standing in for one day for Judge Michael Walsh, heard in Dublin Circuit Civil Court that Judge Walsh had been scheduled to hear the 13-year-old case over the next three days but was sick.

Bobby Fitzgerald, accountant of Cregg, Carrick-on-Suir, is suing Maura Derivan, who finished her year as Law Society of Ireland President last month, and her husband, Patrick, both of whom practice as Derivan Sexton Solicitors at New Street, Carrick-on-Suir. The trial was set to begin today.

The case, which was moved out of the South Eastern Circuit to Dublin on the application of the Derivans, arises from alleged defamatory statements in written correspondence by Derivan Sexton in matters relating to one of their clients, plasterer Bernard Brophy, of Owning, Piltown, county Kilkenny, who was joined as a defendant. Mr Brophy had been involved in a house purchase transaction with Fitzgerald’s company, Fitzgerald Fleming Long Accountants.

There was no other judge available today to start a keenly fought three-day case involving several senior counsel leading legal teams for Fitzgerald and the Derivans as well as Brophy.

The trial could not, in any case, have gone ahead today as another unrelated matter listed for two hours had been marked “to be given priority at the top of the list” and, itself, was stated to stretch to a full day.

The priority case had been scheduled for two hours but counsel told Judge Berkeley that it would last a full day.

Judge Berkeley was drafted in just for Monday after Judge Walsh was reported to be sick. She was unable to start what was going to be at least a three-day trial previously stated to last four days.

It is now unlikely the scheduled three-day case can be shoe-horned into only two remaining days and is in danger of being adjourned.