Darren’s abuse by the priest ended when he was 11. His story remains one of the worst I’ve heard
So extreme had been Darren’s abuse by Tony Walsh that the former priest was sentenced in December 2010 to a total of 123 years imprisonment. Five of the 13 counts, for buggery, attracted sentences of 10, 12, 14, 16 and [another] 16 years each. The remaining counts, for indecent assault, brought sentences ranging from four to nine years each.
Walsh raped him with his wrists tied to his ankles as he was made to lie across a coffee table at the presbytery in Ballyfermot, which Walsh then shared with Fr Michael Cleary and his housekeeper, Phyllis Hamilton, with whom, it emerged later, Cleary had two sons. Darren was “crying loudly” and “hysterical”. Walsh, who had turned up the music to drown out the child’s cries, took “about an hour to calm me down. I then went home,” Darren said. This assault led to one of the 16-year sentences.
Another incident took place at Enniscrone, Co Sligo. About 50 children from Ballyfermot were taken there for a break by Walsh and three other priests, including Cleary. Walsh took Darren to the sand dunes where he raped him. The child was bleeding so Walsh brought him to the sea where he washed off the blood, but the salt water stung the child’s wounds, adding to his pain and distress.
Darren was also raped by Walsh in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. Afterwards, Walsh wiped him with “a purple sash [stole] he had with him”. He brought Darren back to the presbytery in Ballyfermot, “put on Elvis records . . . and gave me a glass of Coke”. “He then showed me a Bible with pictures of hell and said if I told anyone I would burn in hell and never go to heaven. Then he let me go home.”
One evening Darren told his mother a watered-down version of what was happening. They had been watching a BBC programme about child sexual abuse. Outraged, she went to the presbytery in Ballyfermot and knocked, accompanied by Darren’s aunt. The door was answered by Phyllis Hamilton, who denied that Walsh was inside.
Darren’s mother insisted he must be in because his car was there. They thought they had seen him through a window. Hamilton went inside and Walsh came to the door. He denied everything. As Prof Browne put it in the victim impact report: “then, knowing the game was up, Walsh stopped abusing Darren altogether and terminated their relationship”.
Tony Walsh spent eight years trying to stop his trial from going ahead, exhausting the judicial review process en route. He had failed similarly in another case in 1997. That time, after another round-the-houses judicial review process funded by free legal aid, he eventually pleaded guilty and served time. But he forced the December 2010 trial involving Darren McGavin by denying all charges. The jury found him guilty, unanimously, on all 13 counts after just 94 minutes.
https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books...ive-heard/
So extreme had been Darren’s abuse by Tony Walsh that the former priest was sentenced in December 2010 to a total of 123 years imprisonment. Five of the 13 counts, for buggery, attracted sentences of 10, 12, 14, 16 and [another] 16 years each. The remaining counts, for indecent assault, brought sentences ranging from four to nine years each.
Walsh raped him with his wrists tied to his ankles as he was made to lie across a coffee table at the presbytery in Ballyfermot, which Walsh then shared with Fr Michael Cleary and his housekeeper, Phyllis Hamilton, with whom, it emerged later, Cleary had two sons. Darren was “crying loudly” and “hysterical”. Walsh, who had turned up the music to drown out the child’s cries, took “about an hour to calm me down. I then went home,” Darren said. This assault led to one of the 16-year sentences.
Another incident took place at Enniscrone, Co Sligo. About 50 children from Ballyfermot were taken there for a break by Walsh and three other priests, including Cleary. Walsh took Darren to the sand dunes where he raped him. The child was bleeding so Walsh brought him to the sea where he washed off the blood, but the salt water stung the child’s wounds, adding to his pain and distress.
Darren was also raped by Walsh in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. Afterwards, Walsh wiped him with “a purple sash [stole] he had with him”. He brought Darren back to the presbytery in Ballyfermot, “put on Elvis records . . . and gave me a glass of Coke”. “He then showed me a Bible with pictures of hell and said if I told anyone I would burn in hell and never go to heaven. Then he let me go home.”
One evening Darren told his mother a watered-down version of what was happening. They had been watching a BBC programme about child sexual abuse. Outraged, she went to the presbytery in Ballyfermot and knocked, accompanied by Darren’s aunt. The door was answered by Phyllis Hamilton, who denied that Walsh was inside.
Darren’s mother insisted he must be in because his car was there. They thought they had seen him through a window. Hamilton went inside and Walsh came to the door. He denied everything. As Prof Browne put it in the victim impact report: “then, knowing the game was up, Walsh stopped abusing Darren altogether and terminated their relationship”.
Tony Walsh spent eight years trying to stop his trial from going ahead, exhausting the judicial review process en route. He had failed similarly in another case in 1997. That time, after another round-the-houses judicial review process funded by free legal aid, he eventually pleaded guilty and served time. But he forced the December 2010 trial involving Darren McGavin by denying all charges. The jury found him guilty, unanimously, on all 13 counts after just 94 minutes.
https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books...ive-heard/
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
