Jan
31
Niall O’Donnchu and Laura Barnes
January 31, 2010 | 1 Comment
O‘Donnchu and Barnes
In 2005 Laura Barnes, an American book dealer, made a profit of up to €800,000 from selling a cache of James Joyce papers to the state. One year later she began a relationship with Ó Donnchú, an assistant secretary in the Department of Arts, Sports and Tourism.
In 2006, a blogger who styles himself as Ardmayle posted a comment about the couple and the sale of the Joycean manuscripts under the headline “Barnes and Noble”. Following a legal complaint, he took down the blog and in February 2007 he posted an apology which had been supplied by Ó Donnchú’s and Barnes’ lawyer, Ivor Fitzpatrick solicitors.
In 2007, Ó Donnchú was cleared of wrongdoing by an internal inquiry in the Department of Arts. It concluded that the department’s interests were not compromised by his relationship with Barnes, and that the official had “dealt appropriately” with his responsibilities under ethics legislation.
In 2008, members of the Committee of Public Accounts accused the National Library of Ireland of being “stung” in the Joycean papers deal. The library could have bought the papers from a Parisian bookseller for €400,000 in 2004. They eventually paid €1.17m to Barnes.
Ardmayle has agreed a €100,000 settlement after libelling Niall Ó Donnchú, a senior civil servant, and his girlfriend Laura Barnes. It is the first time in Ireland that defamatory material on a blog has resulted in a pay-out.
It is also a complete piss-take with an art dealer, an art collector and a senior civil servant raking in the money as we speak, a shower of media whores who think they are above the level of people like you and I.
I wrote a long diatribe about them but thanks to crap broadband and lots of wine it is now lost to the ether. All three people involved are cunts, media and money whores of the worst level imaginable, best left alone to their own devices and ignored.
Comments
1 Comment so far
I entirely agree re Barnes and O Donnchu. They’re a right pair.