Luis Rubiales' infamous kiss on Jenni Hermoso during the Women’s World Cup celebrations in August 2023 provoked a global reaction. He swore it was consensual. She did not. But the subsequent behaviour of the former football association president, and three other officials, has since escalated into a full-blown criminal trial. If convicted on charges of sexual aggression, he could face two and a half years of jail time. But how realistic is a custodial sentence? And why is he also accused of coercion? As the trial concludes this week, Dermot Corrigan from The Athletic and The New York Times in Madrid, breaks down the legal battle surrounding Rubiales, outlines the testimony of Hermoso and explains the cultural fallout which led to #SeAcabó - Spain's #MeToo movement, and its subsequent backlash.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Aideen Finnegan.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Consumer affairs correspondent Conor Pope joins In the News to discuss the rise in online romance scams, while Dublin woman Stacey* shares her own experience of losing more than €20,000 to an online fraudster, who pretended to be Coldplay's Chris Martin.

Presented by Sorcha Pollak, produced by Suzanne Brennan.

*Pseudonym used to protect interviewee’s identity 

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Last November, in one of the most surprising stories of the general election, Gerard Hutch, the head of the Hutch organised crime gang, came close to securing the final seat in the Dublin Central constituency. The veteran criminal, better known as the Monk, had returned to take part in the election while on bail from Spanish authorities who were investigating money laundering. His surprise run for the Dáil was made while Irish Times crime and security correspondent Conor Gallagher was working on a new RTÉ documentary called AKA The Monk. Gallagher joins the podcast to discuss the two-part documentary into the life, and career, of Gerard Hutch. AKA The Monk is available now on the RTÉ Player.

Presented by Sorcha Pollak. Produced by Aideen Finnegan. 

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Take a five-minute walk in any direction in Dublin city centre and you’ll come across boarded-up, even cemented-over shopfronts, upper floors supported by steel struts and foliage growing through the roof.

Properties in prime locations left to rot in the capital city, in the middle of a housing crises. It doesn’t make any kind of sense.

In theory it should be easy to find out who owns these decaying properties but it’s not. Nor is it straightforward to discover exactly why valuable properties have been left, sometimes for decades, as eyesores.

For a new Irish Times series, Derelict Dublin, Olivia Kelly, along with colleagues Ronan McGreevy and Jack White investigated why the city is blighted by decay and what the council is doing about it.

Kelly came into studio to explain.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Declan Conlon and Suzanne Brennan. 

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When it comes to the political pecking order, Minister for Arts is way down the list. It’s been called the last seat on the bus.

The newly-appointed arts minister is Patrick O’Donovan and quite how much interest or experience the Fine Gael TD has in the arts – or culture, also part of the job- is not clear.

And his portfolio is massive – it includes communications, media and sport.

Two tricky and pressing issues for O’Donovan are RTE’s ongoing funding problems and the soon-to-end basic income for artists programme. And there’s so much more.

Hugh Linehan, who wrote a no-holds-barred column questioning O’Donovan’s suitability for the job, explains why in a country that prides itself on its arts and culture, the arts ministry is, in political terms, a low prestige role.

And following the new Minister’s visit to Montrose to talk to RTE chief Kevin Bakhurst, Laura Slattery explores his peculiar obsession with the station’s programming - and why he’s got it wrong.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Declan Conlon and John Casey.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On the campaign trail, Donald Trump promised he would end the war in Ukraine  in just 24 hours. Despite missing his own deadline, Trump has threatened Russia with high tariffs and further sanctions if Putin fails to end the war. But this week, Donald Trump announced he was “looking to do a deal with Ukraine”. In return for further US military aid, Trump wants access to Ukraines rare earths, critical elements used in electronics, such as  titanium, lithium, graphite and uranium. 

So what will this development mean for the future of peace talks? And does Trump really have an interest in ending the war in Ukraine?

Sorcha Pollak speaks to Irish Times Eastern Europe correspondent Dan McLaughlin from Kyiv.

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At the White House on Tuesday US President Donald Trump announced an outrageous idea to end the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The US would seize control of the strip and turn it into “the Riviera of the Middle East”. Trump suggested Palestinians who had been living through "hell" could live in neighbouring Arabic nations like Egypt and Jordan, funded by wealthy countries. The declaration was made at a joint press conference at the White House with Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu; who welcomed the idea without explicitly backing it. The suggestion was roundly condemned in the Middle East and criticised by the international community. Sky's Middle East correspondent Alistair Bunkal says it raises more questions than Trump’s bizarre answer to an entrenched geopolitical problem.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Aideen Finnegan.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

During his last presidency Donald Trump slapped a tariff on Kerrygold butter; costing its parent company, Ornua, €50m in one year. A fortnight into his second presidency and it’s clear sweeping tariffs are now a core part of the agenda for his second stint in the White House. He's hit China with a 10% tax, while Canada and Mexico have been given a month before their US exports are levied with 25% duties. And the 78 year-old has been explicit about his plans to impose tariffs on goods coming from the European Union, saying the EU bloc’s approach to trade is an “atrocity”. So, what exactly is a tariff and why is Donald Trump so focused on imposing them? And what does this all mean for Ireland’s main exports and our country’s foreign direct investment? Irish Times economics correspondent Eoin Burke Kennedy outlines how the 'Americanisation' of our economy has left us vulnerable to Trump's tariffs and tax plans, and what may be offered by Brussels to appease Washington's whims.

Presented by Sorcha Pollak, produced by Aideen Finnegan.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When the parents of eight-year-old Elizabeth Struhs stopped giving her the insulin she needed to control her diabetes, they thought God would cure her.

And when the little girl slowly died in their home in the Australian city of Toowoomba they and other members of the Saints, a religious sect stood by waiting for her to rise from the dead.

The details that emerged at the trial in Queensland of the 14 members of the cult were harrowing. The court heard that the child’s father Jason Struhs finally called emergency services 36 hours after his daughter’s death, saying “though God would still raise Elizabeth, they could not leave a corpse in the house”.

Both Jason and her mother Kerrie Struhs were found guilty of manslaughter. The sect’s leader, Brendan Stevens was found guilty of manslaughter for encouraging the father to withhold insulin from his daughter in January 2022.

The Saints are a conservative Christian sect made up mostly of three families who believe in speaking in tongues and who reject modern medicine as “witchcraft”.

The 14 will be sentenced on February 11th.

Andrew Messenger from the Guardian Australia details this tragic case.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by Suzanne Brennan.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode was first published in November 2024.

Veteran republican Marian Price initiated legal action against streaming giant Disney+ after the release of TV drama Say Nothing, based on a book of the same name by Patrick Radden Keefe, which her lawyers say depicted her as being involved in the murder of Belfast woman Jean McConville.

Lawyers for Price, who was jailed for her part in the IRA’s London bombing campaign of 1973, said the allegation was “not based on a single iota of evidence”.

In this episode we replay an interview with Patrick Radden Keefe, recorded when Say Nothing was published in 2018.

Radden Keefe explains how he reached his conclusion that Marian Price was centrally involved in McConville's killing, along with her sister Dolours Price.

The Disney dramatisation of Say Nothing has brought the stories of the Price sisters and Jean McConville to a new global audience.

"Such allegations published on an international scale are not only unjustified, but they are odious insofar as they seek to cause our client immeasurable harm in exchange for greater streaming success. Our client has now been forced to initiate legal proceedings to hold Disney to account for their actions", Prices lawyers said.

Presented by Bernice Harrison. Produced by John Casey.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.