The High Court has dismissed a breach of privacy and defamation case taken by the partner of David Agnew and her baby son.
Ruth Hickey, 36, had sued the Sunday World over the publication of photographs of her and Mr Agnew after they registered their son's birth in 2006.
The president of the High Court Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns dismissed the case.
However, he said the newspaper had engaged in the 'lowest standards of journalism imaginable'.
Mr Justice Nicolas Kearns said it was a regrettable fact of life that such material sells newspapers.
He also said Ms Hickey had previously actively sought publicity about her relationship with Mr Agnew by giving interviews.
The pictures complained of were taken in a public place and did not breach privacy rights.
He said there were many strange and unexplained aspects of the case, which he found disquieting but on his interpretation of the applicable legal principles, the newspaper was entitled to have the case dismissed.
Ms Hickey had also claimed she was defamed by the newspaper repeating an offensive word used about her by Mr Agnew's ex-wife, Adele King, also known as Twink.
However, Mr Justice Kearns said no reasonable reader would have agreed that the use of the word ‘whore’ portrayed her has a prostitute.
He said the words, which were contained in a voice mail left by Ms King for Mr Agnew, had made it onto the internet before being published in the newspaper.
Ms King had called Ms Hickey a ‘whore’ and her child a ‘bastard’. The judge said the general tone of the message could be deduced from one of its milder passages in which she described Mr Agnew as ‘a fat, bald middle aged dickhead’.
