A recent High Court decision has confirmed that an action for breach of privacy may not succeed where the aggrieved party has a history of soliciting media attention.

In this case, the partner of Twink’s ex-husband, Ruth Hickey, lost her defamation and breach of privacy case against the Sunday World which published photographs of her at the office of Births, Marriages and Deaths where she was registering the birth of her son.  The newspaper’s freedom of expression was found to outweigh any right to privacy that Ms Hickey had. The Court held that the photographs taken of Ms Hickey and her son at the office were taken in a public place when Ms Hickey was performing a public function and therefore, did not disclose any more information than would have been available to any member of the public in the vicinity of the office that day. The Court was also guided by the fact that Ms Hickey had already courted the media to publicise her relationship with Mr Agnew and the birth of their child.

Ms Hickey was also unsuccessful in a defamation claim arising from the publication of the now notorious voicemail message in which Twink referred to Ms Hickey and her son using offensive words. The content of the message had already been uploaded to the internet and was therefore already in the public domain.

The decision can be compared to the landmark ruling of the European Court of Human Rights in which it was held that publishing paparazzi photographs of Princess Caroline of Monaco was a violation of her right to privacy.  In that case it was held that the decisive factor in balancing the right to privacy against freedom of expression should lie in the contribution that the published photos make to a debate of general interest. The Court in that case decided that the public did not have a legitimate interest in knowing where Princess Caroline was and how she behaved in her private life even if she appeared in public places.

The two decisions can be distinguished from one another by the incompatibility of Ms Hickey seeking publicity concerning the birth of her child when later she sought to protect its privacy.

This article was authored by Sinéad Keavey.