AN 87-YEAR-OLD Donegal man who raped and sexually abused five of his granddaughters over a 19-year period has been sentenced to 15 years at the Central Criminal Court.
The man “groomed” each girl in an almost identical fashion. He started off by talking to them about sex when they were about seven before moving on to molest them “to show them what boys expected” of them.
When the girls were about 11, he started raping them and, with the exception of one victim, this would continue several times a week until their mid-teens. He committed his final rape last year when he was 86.
On many occasions, he took Viagra to enable him to perform the rapes. He would threaten the girls that if they did not do as he said he would abuse their sisters instead.
The man, who cannot be named to protect his victims’ identities, pleaded guilty to 45 sample counts of rape, indecent assault, sexual assault and aggravated sexual assault at various locations in his rural community between July 1993 and September 2009.
Mr Justice Paul Carney declared the man a sex offender and sentenced him to five years for indecent and sexual assault, to run concurrent to the 15 years.
Mr Justice Carney suspended the final three years of the sentence and remarked that the sentence would “not be expiring until the man is well into his hundreds”. A detective garda stationed in the area told prosecuting counsel, Patricia McLaughlin, that the abuse emerged after one of the victims detailed what happened during a counselling session, causing the others to come forward. An incident room was set up in the local Garda station and the man was arrested soon after.
The court heard the man began taking the eldest victim on walks on the beach and talking to her about sex. He said he would teach her how to “french kiss” because boys would expect her to do this and then moved on to molesting her.
If she resisted or seemed nervous, he would tell her to “smarten up” and that “it’s for your own good”. When she was 11, he raped her for the first time, telling her it would “do you no harm”.
After this, he raped her about three times a week, either on the beach or in his home if his wife was away. Sometimes he would abuse her in her house when he was babysitting the children. If she protested, he told her he would do it to her other sisters instead.
On another occasion, he told her that her father would kill her “for taking advantage of an old man” if she told anyone.
The girl started to rebel at home in an effort to get grounded so she would not be sent on walks with her grandfather. This led to her leaving home in her mid-teens causing the rapes to stop.
As each of the girl’s younger sisters grew older, the abuse happened to them in an almost identical way.
With the second victim, he again told her “it’s you or the girls” and that if she told anyone, they would all be taken away. On one occasion before raping her, he broke a branch off a tree and used this along with a bicycle brake lever to sexually abuse her.
He told one of the other girls that he was “teaching her” and that it was for her own good. He would give her rewards afterwards, including alcohol. This continued two or three times a week until she ran away from home. When one girl refused to let him rape her, he said he would get sick and die if he did not have sex with her. When he was raping the youngest victim, he could no longer bring her down to the beach as he was nearly blind. Instead he would abuse or rape her in his bed whenever his wife was away. He raped her “two or three times” after she turned 11.
When the man was arrested, he admitted some of the incidents in interview but claimed the girls had often initiated the sex.
He claimed one was “fond of sex” and another had told him to get Viagra from the doctor so they could have sex. He told gardaí he knew what he was doing was wrong and “that this day would come”.
Victim impact reports were read in court on behalf of the women. They detailed how the abuse ruined their trust in their family and in men.
One woman said she had tried to commit suicide several times and abused alcohol and drugs because of the abuse.
Defence counsel Peter Finlay said his client had been married for nearly six decades but was no longer welcome in his home. He has no previous convictions and has been in custody since his arrest last June.
Mr Finlay accepted they were “monstrous and evil acts” but offered his client’s apologies and submitted that any lengthy sentence imposed would likely be a life sentence due to the man’s age.