A federal appeals court has blocked a lower court’s order that Boston College turn over to federal prosecutors transcripts and other oral-history documents sought by British authorities in an investigation of violence in Northern Ireland decades ago. According to The Boston Globe, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit issued a stay on Friday of an order issued earlier last week by a federal judge that the college provide records of an oral history of Dolours Price, a former member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army.
The college, which had opposed the federal prosecutors’ efforts, said it would not appeal the ruling by Judge William G. Young of the federal district court in Boston. But two researchers involved in creating the oral history did appeal. They argued that disclosing the records would reopen what the Globe called “politically sensitive wounds” in Northern Ireland and could even jeopardize the safety of one of them, who lives there. The appeals court said it would hold hearings to determine if disclosure would indeed threaten the researcher.
The oral history was compiled as part of the Belfast Project, an effort at the college to preserve recollections of the Troubles, a period of political and religious violence in Northern Ireland. Critics have said disclosure could violate academic freedom and hamper the work of oral historians.
