Carson McDowell

Fergal is a Partner in the Media, Communications & Reputation, and Litigation & Dispute Resolution teams, specialising in media and communications, commercial litigation, and public and administrative law.

He regularly acts for leading national, regional, and local news publishers and websites in the defence of libel claims, private and confidential information claims, personal data claims, and pre-publication injunction applications.

He also assists publishers with Anonymity and Reporting Restriction challenges, contempt matters, and individual journalists facing a variety of criminal and civil proceedings.

In addition he acts for a significant number of US headquartered social media platforms on legal issues in Northern Ireland.

Apart from his media litigation defence work, Fergal acts for various corporates, SMEs, prominent/public figures and professionals in maintaining, defending and vindicating their reputations.

Outside media and communications he maintains a significant public law practice, acting for, amongst others, a large non-departmental public body charged with producing numerous sensitive decisions annually. He has also assisted in the preparation of various CEOs, senior civil servants, academics, and lawyers for appearances before statutory hearings and inquiries.

In addition to his litigation experience, he regularly delivers guest lectures on media and communications law to students on the MA in Journalism at Ulster University, was consulted on the Northern Ireland chapter of McNae’s Essential Law for Journalists, (26th Ed., July 2022), provides commentary to the media on media law matters, and was invited to address the Society of Editors Annual Conference in 2020.

Fergal graduated with a (LLB honours) degree in Law and Marketing where he was awarded the Sweet and Maxwell University Law Prize, before completing an LLM in International Human Rights Law and a masters degree in Business Studies. He subsequently qualified as a Solicitor from the Institute of Professional Legal Studies (Queen’s University) with commendation, and was awarded the Mills Selig Prize on qualification.