Indo expression of regret ‘too little, to late’ for family

SENIOR executives at the Sunday Independent newspaper yesterday said ‘Sorry’ for publishing a false account of Liam Lawlor’s death, but were warned by a family member any apology was “too little, too late”.

Fred Barber, brother of Mr Lawlor’s widow, Hazel, described the newspaper reports as dreadful, reckless and absolutely disgraceful and said of his sister: “She is heartbroken, completely grief-stricken.”

Another relative, Ms Lawlor’s sister, Aileen Gilson, who had to break the news of her husband’s death to her, said the family had tried to keep the newspaper reports from her to avoid additional distress, but she heard about them and insisted on seeing them.

“She just said that’s not Liam, that is not Liam. She was broken-hearted. She could not believe it,” Ms Gilson said.

It emerged yesterday that suggestions that Julia Kushnir, the woman travelling with Mr Lawlor, was a prostitute, could have been discounted if the family had been contacted directly but Mrs Gilson said this did not happen.

Mr Barber said his sister knew Ms Kushnir; was familiar with the translator’s work; had met her previously in Prague and knew she was travelling with her husband to Moscow the day he died.

“Julia was doing a lot of work for Liam and other business people out there that Liam was associated with. She was acting on his behalf as translator. She also did legal secretarial work. She was familiar with Hazel and they did meet on one occasion,” said Mr Barber.

Even as the family were expressing their hurt and anger to RTÉ’s Joe Duffy, however, it emerged the executive speaking for the Sunday Independent had not discussed the matter with the paper’s editor a full day after the reports were published.

Despite his pledge of an “immediate” inquiry into the way the story was handled, managing editor Michael Denieffe admitted he had not spoken to editor, Aengus Fanning, as he “could not reach him”.

“I can only say that the details are fairly sketchy at the moment. A lot of the principal people involved, I will only be talking to them tomorrow. We are launching an immediate investigation as soon as all the people are available,” Mr Denieffe said.

“He [Mr Fanning] was on duty on Saturday night but I have not yet had an opportunity to discuss it with him in detail. I have not been able to reach him this morning. There will be a conversation with him tomorrow.”

Mr Denieffe also insisted that “editorial executives were satisfied at the time that the story was correct” although he accepted now that it was inaccurate and had caused enormous distress for which he “apologised profusely”.

Mrs Gilson said, however, she did not believe an apology would do much to ease the family’s distress.

“It’s too little, too late. Yesterday was the worst day of their lives and then they had to endure the Sunday newspapers. One headline was worse than another.”

She continued: “The amazing thing about Liam was that when things were written about him he would say: ‘These people are doing their job. I can’t be a la carte. When I wanted them to write something about me when I was running for election, they wrote good things about me.’ But we were not expecting this. That’s the horror of it.”

Her brother added: “Liam was a man who could handle that sort of thing. His family are not in politics. His wife is not in politics.”