The Irish Times Social Affairs Correspondent, Carl O’Brien (right), has won the Justice Media Award for Court Reporting for the Print Media. He was presented with the award at a ceremony hosted by the Law Society in Dublin at the weekend.
O’Brien won the award for his series, “Inside the Children’s Court”, which ran over a number of weeks earlier this year. In their citation, the judges said: “Carl presented some beautifully understated cameos that not only contain great insights into the workings of the court but also reveal the effects of criminality on children, their families and those charged with the responsibility of enforcing law and working towards the rehabilitation of children.”
Cormac O’Keeffe of the Irish Examiner was the overall winner of the Justice Media Awards for his three-day series “Inside Irish Prisons”, which the judges described as “excellent and thought-provoking”.
The award in the Sunday Newspapers section went to Mark Tighe of the Sunday Times for his article “How many solicitors would it take to weed out the dodgy ones?”
Maria Rolston of the Evening Echo won the Regional Newspapers award for her series of articles, “Community Service – an exploration”.
For his coverage of the “Lying eyes: Ennis Hitman Case”, radio journalist John Cooke of Clare FM won the award in the Court Reporting for Broadcast Media section.
Legal News Photograph of the year went to Denis Minihane of the Irish Examiner for his photos of miscarriage of justice victim Walter Swift.
In the National Radio category, Declan Carty and John O’Donovan of Newstalk won an award for the “Legal column” on Late Night Live.
In the Local Radio category, Radio Kerry’s Deirdre Walsh won an award for a story about a young woman with Down Syndrome who was allegedly sexually assaulted.
Trevor Birney of Below the Radar Productions won an award for “The Devil in the Detail”, broadcast on Prime Time in January which was described as “a fine examination of the technical, scientific and legal issues surrounding Low Copy Number DNA”.
– Kitty Holland