Foreword

• Date: 01 January 2023
• Author: Michael Quinn

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Foreword

is year’s volume of the Hibernian Law Journal illustrates the outstanding legal

writing which has come to characterise this journal and its contributions to the

wider legal community. e work done by the Journal in encouraging the legal

scholarship of the younger members of the legal professions is invaluable and

the role of academic writings cannot be understated. e scope and depth of the

contributions are truly impressive and address the increasingly complex challenges

facing today’s legal scholar, practitioner, the bench and our society. I congratulate

all the authors on the in-depth research and clarity of their work.

Kiri O’Neill in her case note on the recent decision of the Grand Chamber of the

European Court of Human Rights in Sanchez v France analysed the court’s response

to a French politician’s unsuccessful attempt to appeal his conviction under French

law holding him liable for unlawful comments published on his Facebook wall

by other users on the basis of Article 10 of the European Convention on Human

Rights. e author noted that in Sanchez, while there were no substantial changes

in what constitutes hate speech, there was a signicant expansion of who is liable

for it. In its analysis of the caselaw the Grand Chamber addressed the challenges

posed to the bench and policy makers by social media and its changeability and

diversity which inherently make it dicult to regulate. Constant unpredictable

and rapid changes generate innumerable variables which impact on the balance

of liability. Evermore so in the context of hate speech where the court must

balance the protection of freedom of speech and the censure of hate speech in

highly politicised spaces. e author is commendably direct in her critique of the

judgment of the Grand Chamber, places the case in the context of other recent

caselaw and commentary on this highly contentious topic.

Lucy Heery’s article on ‘Piercing the Corporate Veil: Powers v Greymountain

Management Ltd (in Liquidation) and Others [2022] IEHC 599’ analyses Mr.

Justice Twomey’s judgment where he found two directors and two shadow directors

personally liable for funds which were lost due to international fraud. is involved

an Irish registered company which was alleged to have acted as the middleman

in a scheme to defraud ‘investors’ by inducing them from a call centre in Israel to

invest in binary options. No real trades were ever executed, and the money was

instead converted to the use of Greymountain’s non-resident shadow directors. e

doctrine of separate legal personality as set out in Salomon v Salomon and Fyes

plc v DCC & Ors is familiar to every legal student and practitioner. However, the

author observes this was the rst time an Irish court pierced the corporate veil to

hold directors personally liable for their company’s acts or omissions in such a case,

outside the framework of the statutory provisions for imposing personal liability