Price’s defamation suit has to do with the series’ big finale reveal, in which she is depicted “as having carried out the execution-style murder” of McConville, per her filing. Per The Hollywood Reporter, she is now calling for damages and an injunction preventing defendants Disney and Minim UK Productions Limited “from further publishing the same or similar defamatory statements.” She also wants Disney to remove the scene that shows her committing the crime from the episode altogether.
Price has denied killing McConville since the allegation was raised in Patrick Radden Keefe’s book upon which the adaptation is based. She apparently threatened a lawsuit against Keefe’s publisher, which never came to fruition. Price’s lawyer previously asserted that “it is clear that the instant allegation is not based on a single iota of evidence.” However, Keefe stands by it: “I wouldn’t have published Marian’s name and suggested that she murdered Jean McConville if I had even one per cent doubt that it was true. It would be unconscionable to make such an accusation if I was not completely certain. But I was certain,” Keefe told Sunday World last year. “She has denied it, though I would note that it took her five months from when I initially approached her solicitor for comment back in May to do so. I stand by my reporting. I’m quite transparent about my process of deduction in the book, so readers can decide for themselves whether they are persuaded.”
The creators of the Say Nothing show reiterated as much when discussing the finale with The Hollywood Reporter. “To me, the ending in the book—and I know this is true for Patrick as well—is not speculative. It’s definitely not meant to be, ‘this is what might’ve happened.’ It was really thoroughly fact-checked by multiple sources,” Josh Zetumer said. “So despite the narrative device that Patrick uses of putting himself in the story, the ending is meant to be definitive: This is the killer of Jean McConville. If Patrick didn’t feel that way, he wouldn’t have printed it. And if we didn’t feel [that] way, we wouldn’t have put it on TV.”
