Veronica Guerin - Dying for the Story

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.4 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 26 June 2018

⏱️ 10 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In June 1996, the campaigning Irish journalist Veronica Guerin was murdered by a hit squad as she waited in her car at a set of traffic lights. Guerin had become famous in Ireland for exposing the activities of the country's drug barons. Her life was later turned into a Hollywood film. Simon Watts talks to Guerin's friend and fellow journalist, Lise Hand.

(Photo: Veronica Guerin. Credit: Getty Images).

Transcript

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0:00.0	Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know.
0:04.7	My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds.
0:08.5	As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices.
0:18.0	What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,
0:24.6	poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples.
0:29.7	If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds.
0:36.0	Hello and thank you for downloading the BBC World Service History Program Witness with me Simon Watts. Today we're going back to June 1996 and the story of
0:46.9	the campaigning Irish journalist Veronica Gereen who was killed for her work
0:51.6	exposing Ireland's drug bosses.
0:56.0	An award-winning Dublin journalist has been murdered by gunman in a drive-by shooting.
1:01.0	Veronica Gerin special specialized in crime reporting.
1:04.3	A year ago she was shot in the legs
1:06.0	after writing articles about Ireland's drug barons.
1:08.9	On June the 26th, 1996,
1:11.3	Veronica Gerin was shot dead. She had become famous for confronting Ireland's powerful
1:16.5	drug lords. I actually got to know a lot of the key figures within the underworld on a personal basis and therefore the stories that I was writing were very, very accurate.
1:30.0	The shooting happened just after one o'clock this afternoon.
1:33.0	Her car had stopped at traffic lights on the outskirts of the city.
1:36.0	Two men on a motor bike pulled alongside, one of them shot her dead.
1:39.0	She was 33 and married with an 8-year-old son.
1:42.0	We became very close because we both love the newspaper business and we both love the general buzz around a newsroom.
1:48.0	This is Lee's Hand, who worked with Veronica Gereen at the Sunday Independent.
	...

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