Followers of Hugh Jordan's frequent run-ins with M'Learned Friends
have often puzzled over his role in one of the most outrageous libels
in modern Irish legal history.
Now thanks to respected author and journalist Ed Moloney the true
story of Hugh's part in the notorious 'Martha Pope Affair' can
finally be told.
have often puzzled over his role in one of the most outrageous libels
in modern Irish legal history.
Now thanks to respected author and journalist Ed Moloney the true
story of Hugh's part in the notorious 'Martha Pope Affair' can
finally be told.
Pope was a Washington high-flier who was seconded to former US Senator
George Mitchell when he accepted President Bill Clinton's invitation
to act as White House envoy to the North in late 1995.
Then one weekend in December 1996, a sensational front-page story
appeared in Jordan's Sunday Worst, The Sunday Tribune and a British
mid-market tabloid, The Mail on Sunday, alleging that Pope was having
a torrid affair with Sinn Fein's Gerry Kelly, who doubled as the
Provisionals' Adjutant-General, and that Britain's Security Service
had secretly bugged their trysts.
Patently nonsensical rubbish, it led to one of the quickest six-figure
libel payouts in the Worst's history.
(£120,000 paid by the Friday after the story). The Mail on Sunday's
legendary crime correspondent Chester Stern, who unwisely agreed to
share Hugh's 'exclusive', also saw his reputation nosedive
overnight, never to recover.
In a new book, Moloney - a former Northern Editor of both the Turbine
and The Irish Times - reveals that Hugh was in the pocket of DUP
leader Ian Paisley and his deputy Peter Robinson (now the North's
First Minister-in-waiting) and the smear was intended to scupper
Mitchell's peace mission.
Moloney writes:
"The story was clearly ludicrous, but it was too salacious for some
editors to ignore. The author [Moloney] was phoned about the story by
his newsdesk in The Sunday Tribune on the Saturday evening and
strongly advised against using it. But the new editor, Matt Cooper,
showing more confidence in his Sunday World sources, overruled his man
in Belfast and the report appeared the next day. It looked like a
great story, but in reality it was nonsense."
Pope successfully sued, winning fulsome apolgies and substantial
damages in the NEXT edition of the Worst.
Kelly - who bombed London in 1973 and later escaped from the Maze
prison - had little, if any, reputation to defame: he was a notorious
rake and this reputation merely served to make the story more
believable.
Hugh's fatal miscalculation, in his haste to do his masters' bidding,
was to assume Pope fell into the same category: but she was a
sophisticated and experienced Washington operator who once headed the
capitol's police force.
As Moloney, who is now based in New York, adds:
"The notion that these two very different people had enjoyed romantic
weekends together during which Kelly had written Pope love poems was
beyond belief. Suspicions about where the story had come from were
sharpened the day after the reports appeared when Paisley called for
Pope's dismissal and Peter Robinson disclosed that he and Paisley had
discussed the allegations with NI Secretary Sir Patrick Mayhew and
British Prime Minister John Major the previous week."
What Maloney didn't know was that the two people who passed on the
DUP's suspicions directly to the gullible Jordan were a fringe member
of the UK Unionist Party who had DUP associates and a member of the
security service MI5.
(Unfortunately, space didn't permit Moloney to mention Hugh's
previous-largest libel debacle - a fantastic tale involving a disused
Donegal hotel and Derrymen intent on bestial pursuits with the local
livestock. KER-CHING!! Another six-figure payout.)
Meanwhile, the North's Chief Justice, Brian Kerr, last week launched a
devastating attack on the Worst's reputation, branding the paper
"slipshod", "shallow", "utterly reprehensible"
and "grossly irresponsible".
Kerr's barely disguised nod-and-a-wink to his fellow judges means any
of Hugh's future writs will be swiftly settled out of court on the
most generous terms to the plantiff.
Ordinarily, this would be enough to cause Hugh sleepless nights at his
plush Ormeau Road penthouse.
But since the self-confessed counterfeiter faces the prospect of 30
years in a 12x8 cell with a 24-stone crack addict called Bubba, maybe
he's not getting that much shut-eye anyway . . .
