A 77-YEAR-OLD Cork man who sexually abused four of his daughters in a ritualistic manner from 1955 to 1970 has been jailed for seven years. Before he was sentenced, the defendant said: "I apologise to them from the bottom of my heart. I am deeply regretful and I can't find the words to say how sorry I am."
The Central Criminal Court was told a probation report found the former teacher practised his religion in a "remarkably visible fashion". He sent his daughters to confession after abuse sessions to confess their "sins" and interrogated them afterwards to find out what the priest had said.
He knew the sanctity of the confessional prevented the priests from repeating what they had been told. Priests had vainly tried to persuade the girls to go for help or repeat their revelations outside the confession box. The man also warned them their ill mother would die if they revealed what was happening.
The victims, now aged 53 to 41, came forward to make statements to gardai only in 1997 after her death.
When told he was seeking a suspended sentence, his 48-yearold daughter, who was sexually abused hundreds of times, said: "I don't give a tuppence halfpenny damn if he drops dead tomorrow. If he is hung by the legs till his last days, it will not be enough."
The man, who is engaged to be married to a family friend in her 70s, admitted 21 charges of rape and indecent assault of his daughters on unknown dates from 1955 to 1970. The girls were abused weekly from a very young age. He usually stopped the abuse when a girl reached puberty for fear of making her pregnant. The offences involved touching, masturbation, oral sex and full sex.
Mr Tom Creed, defending, asked for a suspended sentence, saying: "A custodial sentence may be a terminal sentence because of his health problems and dietary problems." He had signed over the family home to the victims as a gesture of compensation.
A detective told Mr Patrick McCarthy, prosecuting, the defendant was born in 1921 and worked as a teacher. He married in the 1940s and had a large family. He was interviewed by gardai in February 1997 and he admitted the abuse, though he claimed he could not recall much of the details.
He also suggested the abuse stopped in 1963 when, he said, his late wife became aware of his behaviour, but there was evidence she was not told until much later and that the abuse of one of the girls took place in 1970.
The defendant claimed he had first abused his eldest daughter when she was 10. The abuse of the other girls followed the same pattern but one of them recalled being abused from the age of four.
The eldest daughter was in tears when she spoke from the witness box. She said: "I'm here to say how you can see at the age of 53 the effect it has had on my life. Since I was a small child I haven't felt anything but different. I had to protect my mother in case she would die and I would be left with my father.
"He has ruined my relationship with men and my sexual life. I feel subservient at work," she said. When asked her views on a suspended sentence, she replied: "I'd rather not say."
Her 48-year-old sister said: "I want to say as a person I feel I am nothing. I've been miserable all my childhood. I hate myself still and I feel like dirt. I do everything to blank out everything that comes into my head."
Mr Justice Carney said the offending probably stopped almost 30 years ago. At that time about two bills of indictment a year in relation to such sex abuse came before the Central Criminal Court compared to the huge amount now. He said the offences had been ritualistic in character.
He was being asked to suspend the sentence but added: "Modern thinking, as I understand it, is that imprisonment is necessary for rehabilitation."