The High Court has begun hearing a libel action taken by Monica Leech against the Irish Independent for an article in December 2004.
Mrs Leech argues the article repeated untrue allegations made on national radio about her and Fianna Fáil TD Minister Martin Cullen.
On the 17 December 2004 the Irish Independent published an article headlined 'Gasps and Blushes as Norman turns Joe's Show into Vileline'.
The article referred to a caller to RTÉ Radio 1's Liveline programme on the previous day. The caller who identified himself as 'Norman' made a lewd comment about Mrs Leech.
Mrs Leech counsel says that while the comments by 'Norman' came upon RTÉ unexpectedly, Independent Newspapers made a conscious decision to repeat the comments, although dots were printed in place of where the letters of certain words should be.
Monica Leech is sueing for damages. She is arguing the article, read by 612,000 people, resulted from a cold blooded editorial decision to spread vicious, nasty tittle-tattle.
Independent Newspapers is contesting this libel action. Their full defence is yet to be heard. In previous correspondence with solicitors for Mrs Leech, the newsgroup said the article had stated the call to RTÉ was a hoax, that RTÉ had distanced itself from the comments made by 'Norman', and the Independent article was more about what it called RTÉ's embarrassment .
The trial continues tomorrow, when Mrs Leech gives evidence.
