674,000 tune in to Prime Time show on Nally

RTÉ’S Prime Time programme on the Padraig Nally case attracted almost record viewing figures on Tuesday night.

The widespread national interest in the case of the Mayo farmer, sentenced to six years for killing Traveller John ‘Frog’ Ward, prompted 674,000 people to tune in.

This represents just less than half of all those watching television at the time.

It was the second highest rating for the programme since the Prime Time Investigates show - Gardaí, The Force of the Law - in January of last year which was seen by an audience of more than 700,000.

It featured an interview by RTÉ’s legal affairs correspondent Mary Wilson with Pádraig Nally after his conviction.

It also featured interviews with victim Mr Ward’s widow Marie, his sister Sally, and his son Tom, who was with him on the day of the killing in October 2004.

The programme also revealed that there were four bench warrants outstanding for Ward’s arrest at the time of his death.

The controversy over the sentence handed down in the Central Criminal Court last week continues to dominate the media, having been the subject of discussion on RTÉ’s Liveline radio programme for the past three days.

Meanwhile, Mayo GAA county board has said it will not be giving official backing to a protest rally in support of Nally in Athlone next Sunday. The issue was expected to be contentious but the debate lasted just five minutes and was raised under Any Other Business at a meeting in Castlebar.

A delegate demanded to know the position of the executive about the rally organised by the Padraig Nally Support Group. He claimed the widespread impression was being given in the media that Mayo GAA Board was supporting the rally.

A delegate said the GAA should not be in the business of labelling any group of people and to do so was outside the board’s remit and veering toward racism.

County board chairman Paddy Naughton said the board would not be involved in organising or supporting Sunday’s rally, but he expected that a lot of GAA people would be there of their own accord.

Justice Minister Michael McDowell asked people to bear in mind that the judge heard all the evidence.

“But nonetheless, the evidence that came out in this case showed a picture of somebody going back, reloading and going out and finding a man who was at that stage very seriously beaten and wounded, and finishing him off,” he said.

He said that if there was an error in relation to sentencing in the case, there was an appeal structure open to both the Director of Public Prosecutions and Nally’s legal team to bring the matter to a higher court and have it decided.