THE HIGH COURT has heard an allegation that Web Summit founder Paddy Cosgrave “heavily edited” a recording of a heated call he had with a former director and sent it to other staff of the tech conference company in an effort to damage him.

David Kelly was recorded in the 2021 conversation by Mr Cosgrave, which was played to the High Court today. In the recording, Mr Kelly says Mr Cosgrave “broke” him, while he also accused the founder of “making shit up” and of being a “scumbag”.

The Commercial Court is hearing a “bitter” multi-million euro legal row between Mr Cosgrave and minority shareholders and former directors Mr Kelly and Daire Hickey.

Mr Cosgrave is suing Mr Kelly for allegedly breaching his duties while acting as a director. Mr Kelly and Mr Hickey are in turn suing Mr Cosgrave for alleged minority shareholder oppression and breach of a profit-sharing agreement.

Mr Cosgrave and Mr Kelly deny the claims against them.

At the High Court today, it was claimed that Mr Cosgrave messaged Mr Kelly that he was aware of a visit by Mr Kelly, when he was a director of Web Summit, to what Mr Cosgrave described as a Singaporean “brothel”, known there as the “Four Floors of Whores”.

Michael Cush SC, opening the case for Mr Kelly, said it was submitted that Mr Cosgrave had claimed he believed that photos of the visit could have been used [by another] as a “hold” over Mr Kelly.

The court heard that Mr Kelly was leading an investigation with two others into a 2016 allegation of sexual harassment against Mr Hickey made by an employee of Web Summit at an event in New Orleans.

Mr Cush said that Mr Kelly said he and a group were brought to the Singapore venue by “a VC” and that “absolutely nothing” happened inside before he and the group left the venue, which counsel described as a “massive attraction for tourists” due to Singapore “not being known for its nightlife” .

Mr Cosgrave claims that information about what he claims was a “flawed” investigation into the alleged sexual harassment had been concealed from him by Mr Kelly. Mr Kelly denies that information was concealed.

Mr Cush said there was “simply no question” that Mr Cosgrave had “detailed” information on the investigation and that he “knew everything”.

Mr Cush showed a note of a meeting on 5 December, 2016, between Mr Cosgrave and Mr Kelly during which issues involving Mr Hickey were raised that included the alleged New Orleans incident.

The court was shown phone messages from 2019 between Mr Cosgrave and Mr Kelly, in which Mr Cosgrave suggests going public with the complaint to “blow the whole thing up”.

Mr Kelly responds that he did not see the benefit of doing so, to which Mr Cosgrave replies that he is not sure of any downside, “unless [Mr Hickey] has emails where you’ve said things you might regret”.

Mr Cush claims that this was the first sign of a campaign to “damage” Mr Kelly by suggesting the existence of compromising material on Mr Kelly relating to photos of the Singapore trip being in Mr Hickey’s possession.

Mr Cush said the suggestion of compromising material was “an invention to justify [Mr Cosgrave's] behaviour” towards Mr Kelly and that Mr Cosgrave had tweeted that he was working on a book called “Four Floors The Dossier”.

In the recorded March 2021 call, Mr Cosgrave alleges that Mr Kelly “concealed for years sexual harassment by another cofounder” and that he had refused to share the letter of complaint with Mr Cosgrave.

“That’s a lie,” responds Mr Kelly.

“If you want to play dirty, do it right. Thank you for eleven years,” said Mr Kelly, who then accuses Mr Cosgrave of “making shit up”.

“You’re a scumbag for bringing that shit up. You’ve bullied and mind-f****d me so that I question myself,” said Mr Kelly, who resigned that month.

“Go for it. You broke me as a human being. I cried last week. I can’t take that shit. Go to town and tell the world… I am ready. You have diminished my self worth. It’s in your-play book to f*** with [Mr Hickey's] head and that he’ll crumble. Please go for it here,” he said.

Mr Cush said it will be alleged that Mr Cosgrave then took the recording and sent it to a number of Web Summit staff but had “heavily edited” it throughout so that portions of the transcript did not appear in the audio and the conversation ended with Mr Kelly calling Mr Cosgrave a “scumbag”, though it did not end there.

“It was designed to damage Mr Kelly, no question,” said Mr Cush.

The case continues before Mr Justice Michael Twomey and is listed for nine weeks.