Scientologist: Email could have been more temperate

Zabina Collins, a leading member of the Church of Scientology in Ireland, has told a judge she “could have been a little more temperate” about what she had to say in an email to a school principal complaining about a former church member’s talk to schoolboys on cults.

Ms Collins, who admitted in court to having had a teenage drugs and heavy drinking problem, is being sued for defamation by Peter Griffiths, of Cual Gara, Teeling St, Ballina, Co Mayo, for what his counsel, Seamus Ó Tuathail, described as “a vicious character attack”.

“I could have dealt with it in a more temperate way,” Ms Collins said of her complaint to the headmaster of St David’s CBS in Artane, Dublin, following a post on the internet by Mr Griffiths of what he had said to the school’s Leaving Certificate boys in a talk on cults.