And then, there was a departure from the original script. When the statement was read out, all hell broke loose.

So it went with Judge Paul Carney's address to the UCC Law Society last Wednesday evening. The thrust of his address was the controversial VIS delivered by Majella Holohan at the sentencing of Wayne O'Donoghue in January 2006 for the manslaughter of her son, Robert. The tone of the speech, however, suggested that the judge considered himself a victim, and he was getting the grief off his chest. This was his victim impact statement.

The events of January 2006 clearly left Carney bruised. At the sentencing hearing, Holohan departed from the script of her VIS and asked why semen had been found on her dead son's body. This evidence had not been introduced at the trial. The result of the grieving mother's statement was a media furore, in which O'Donoghue was portrayed as a paedophile killer. He was nothing of the sort, nor had the prosecution even suggested he might be. But the court of public opinion, as conducted through sections of the media, convicted him summarily.

The dust has long settled on the whole affair for everybody but the families involved. Why, then, did Carney seek to re-open old wounds last week? Patently, his own pain has lingered and he wished to make a submission to the court of public opinion regarding his victimisation by higher courts, Majella Holohan, and his tempestuous lover, the media.

His address was ostensibly designed for legal professionals, but he arranged for scripts to be delivered to media organisations in advance. Then, on Wednesday afternoon, he changed the script, toning it down and, curiously, removing the names of the principals, even though their identity remained glaringly obvious.

The address was peppered with references to media portrayals, particularly of himself and Majella Holohan.

"For my part, I never cease to be amazed that when the Court of Criminal Appeal wholly suspends a custodial sentence for rapef there isn't a peep out of anybody, but when I then follow their guidance, as I am obliged to do, the heavens fall in." In this instance, he isn't just a victim of the media, but also the appeal court.

Later on, he again refers to a ruling from the appeal court. "I have absolutely no doubt that if such a ruling came from me, I would have been devoured."

Naturally, the victim has a little pop at his oppressors in his impact statement.

The media gave "iconic" status to Majella Holohan. A researcher from RTE's Liveline approached a court official at the sentencing hearing, which "shatters the myth of Mr (Joe) Duffy being a kindly old gentleman who sits by his telephone in Dublin waiting for it to ring." Poor old Joe is only 51 years of age.

Journalists are obviously clueless on the law. Carney's address included a curious vignette about 50 journalists on the batter the night before the sentencing hearing, and the running of a sweepstake among them on what he might rule the following day.

"Nobody won the sweepstake or got anything right, " he told the bemused legal honchos in UCC's Aula Maxima on Wednesday. He also said that, on the day of the sentencing, he counted 100 press people in court. Where did he find the time for counting? How did he recognise them all? Did they have horns?

Judge Fidelma Macken, sitting in the appeal court, was another who bruised Carney's ego. Commenting on Majella Holohan's allegations in her impact statement, Macken recommended that if similar allegations were made again, the trial judge might consider it a mitigating element in sentence.

Carney disagrees. Yet, one plank of his address was that O'Donoghue received a much harsher sentence . . . outside the remit of the court . . . as a result of Majella Holohan's intervention. Logic would suggest that a trial judge should be in a position to attempt to rebalance . . . to use a term in vogue . . . that situation in the name of natural justice.

In any event, kicking off a debate on victim impact statements did not require the re-opening of wounds for the Holohan and O'Donoghue families.

Rampant ego syndrome is an occupational hazard in the law business (as it is in the media), but Carney's affliction should not take from the exemplary service he renders the state.

As the senior judge in the Central Criminal Court, he oversees the administration of the law concerning the most disturbing events and depraved elements thrown up by society. His conduct of the trials is generally viewed as being exceptional. He brooks no baloney from anybody, and particularly not from lawyers who delay trials or operate at snail's pace. On the administrative side of his brief, he has expedited the hearing of murder cases, ensuring that justice would no longer be delayed any more than was absolutely necessary.

Ironically, considering the O'Donoghue case, no judge has done more to highlight the plight of victims of crime. Neither could he be accused of living in an ivory tower. He often attends functions and seminars dealing with victims and has been commended for his approach to the issue.

However, Wednesday's address delved into a trial he oversaw, and as such is regarded in some quarters as crossing a line. In 2004, he prepared an address about the circumstances of the trial of five men for the gangland killing of Kieran Keane, which he had presided over. The then chief justice Ronan Keane instructed him not to go ahead with it. That experience may have led to his changing of the script on Wednesday.

Carney was eight when his parents returned to Dublin from Sweden where they were both academics. He was educated at the exclusive Gonzaga College and called to the Bar in 1966. He was appointed to the bench in 1991. A father of four, his wife Marjorie is a barrister who formerly worked as a consultant dermatologist.

He is known to enjoy the limelight afforded by his more controversial comments, and he has facilitated the media where possible, such as at the beginning of the O'Donoghue trial when TV cameras were allowed to film the courtroom. He is one of the few judges to have expressed no opposition to the principle of broadcasting trials and he has invited reporters to his chambers on social occasions.

But he has also hit out at coverage he regards as inaccurate or unfair. He got an early taste of the lash of the red tops when, in high-profile rape cases in 1992 and 1993, he gave respectively a suspended sentence and a seven-year sentence, both of which were decried as excessively lenient.

Under severe pressure at the time, he was involved in an after-hours incident at Dublin's Shelbourne Hotel. Later, he threatened contempt of court on any media outlet that misrepresented a particular sentence. The incident instructed him on how headlines, rather than detail and legal principles, can dominate public discourse.

A former election agent of Michael McDowell, he has often been touted as being in line for promotion to the Supreme Court, but he may not wish to retreat from the cauldron of trial work to the solitary research of the higher court.

For now, he continues to preside over the Central Criminal Court. Thereon, his ego will remain vulnerable to further bruising from the appeal court and an odd lash in the media. But the ego will continue to reach for the headlines with the shield of justice, and lash out at tabloid tendencies with the sword of truth. It's a question of taking the best of him, and living with the rest.

C.V.

Age: 63
In the news: He made a highly controversial address in Cork on Wednesday about the Wayne O'Donoghue murder trial
Most likely to say: I fought the appeal court, and the appeal court won
Least likely to say: Discretion is the better part of valour