Injunction to stop Sunday World publishing claims about criminality
Lee Cullen, a married father of two from Starwood, Coolmine, Saggart, Dublin, is seeking an interlocutory injunction restraining the newspaper from publishing any more stories saying he is involved in criminal activity.
In the High Court yesterday, Mr Justice Frank Clarke granted his lawyers permission to bring proceedings today at short notice to the newspaper.
Paul O’Higgins SC with James O’Callaghan BL (instructed by McCartan and Burke solicitors) said the newspaper last Sunday printed the latest in a number of articles in which it falsely alleged Mr Cullen was involved in criminal activity and/or involved in major money laundering and/or drug trafficking.
This article however also stated that Mr Cullen was part of Katy French’s social circle and that he (Cullen) had introduced her and her former boyfriend Marcus Sweeney to a man described as one of the country’s biggest drug traffickers.
The article also claimed she was regularly driven around in high-powered cars supplied by Mr Cullen.
Mr Cullen says he knew Ms French because her car broke down six weeks ago and he loaned her a replacement vehicle.
He says he never drove her around in expensive cars and does not know the man described as a drug trafficker that he is supposed to have introduced the couple to.
The article concerning Ms French last Sunday was “the final straw for me”, Mr Cullen said.
He believed that if the newspaper was permitted to continue with its “grossly unfair and false references” that an award of damages for defamation in a year or two would be inadequate to deal with the damage to his reputation.
If an injunction is not granted, his right to a good name is “effectively being crushed,” Mr Cullen said.
Mr Justice Clarke said the Sunday World could be notified by phone of short service of the interlocutory injunction proceedings returnable to the court for today.
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