Religious youth leader jailed for defilement

By Niamh O’Donoghue

A law graduate and religious youth leader has been given a two-year jail term for the defilement and sexual exploitation of a 16-year-old girl in Dublin four years ago.

Mark McMorrow (27) pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to the defilement of Sophia Doyle (19) on December 20, 2020. He also pleaded guilty to sexual exploitation on dates between September and December 2020. He further pleaded to communicating with a child for the purposes of exploitation on dates between April 10, 2019 and December 20, 2020.

Sinead McMullan BL, prosecuting told the court that Ms Doyle wished to waive her right to anonymity to allow McMorrow to be named.

The court heard McMorrow of Woodlands Avenue, Cabinteely, Dublin was 22 years old when the offending began.

Judge James McCourt handed down a two-and-a-half-year sentence with the final six months suspended on certain conditions.

Detective Garda Lisa McDonnell told the court the events occurred between September and December 2020 and ended just a week before Ms Doyle’s 17^th birthday.

She told Ms McMullan that the Doyle’s and McMorrow’s families knew each other through a faith-based group called Community of Nazareth. Her parents had joined when Ms Doyle was around seven or eight and all the families became very close, the court heard.

She was also part of a youth group in which McMorrow became a leader and they saw each other socially. In 2019 when she was a 3^rd year in school and she was struggling with her mental health, they started communicating on social media.

He asked her to start messaging him on Discord, which the court heard was a more private type of messaging.

The victim told a priest what had happened, who then reported it to Tusla, who informed gardaí. The court heard the religious group also hired an independent professional to establish what had occurred.

The girl’s mobile phone was given to gardaí and McMorrow met with them at Dundrum Garda Station where he was interviewed but later released without charge.

He told gardaí that it was a relationship that had turned sexual, having initially considered her a friend. He said he knew what he was doing was illegal but was at a bad time in his life.

David Staunton BL, defending, told the court his client achieved very highly in school and was now a law graduate. He said he was a media officer but was not currently working.

Mr Staunton asked the court to have regard to the number of references handed into the court on behalf of his client.

Judge McCourt sentenced McMorrow to two-and-a-half years with the final two suspended on condition that he has no involvement with the Community of Nazareth, which Ms Doyle no longer attends, and he was not to communicate with the victim in any way.

The judge also told him he could not contact her through social media, especially through the use of Discord.

The court was told McMorrow, who has no previous convictions had taken 800 euro to court to pay for counselling undertaken by the victim but the judge said it didn’t affect the sentence.

Ms Doyle read a victim impact statement to the court in which she said McMorrow had betrayed her trust.

“Mark was in a position of power over me – not only with his age, but he was also in a position of pastoral and religious authority over me.

“He knew I wasn’t able to say ‘no’ and took advantage of that. Mark was a man that I had deeply trusted – that the entire community had trusted,” she added.

“For many years I believed him to be a friend to me, a role model, an older brother figure, and a mentor. But that has come crashing down and the scales have now fallen from my eyes. I was his victim,” she added.

In mitigation, counsel for the accused, who is now married, said references before the court would say the offending “was out of character for him”.

He said his client was now regarded as a sex offender, lost a huge social outlet and was unlikely to be able to visit the United States in the future. Mr Staunton said McMorrow had very genuine and religious beliefs.

The court heard they met on a number of occasions and he invited her over to a house he was sharing with other students in Loughlinstown in south Dublin.

He asked her to meet up but told her not to tell anyone in the group. They would watch movies together and she would get the bus home. At that time they were using Discord for phone calls and they were texting daily.

Her mother asked her to stop texting him because she felt she was becoming emotionally dependent on him. He invited her to his family home and there was nobody else in the house.

They were communicating regularly and she went over to his friend’s house in south Dublin. She said she cycled from her home in Bray to Glenageary in the middle of the night.

He told her to pretend she was leaving the house but then sneaked her upstairs past the living room where his friend was. Both got into bed. Her mother asked her where she had gone and she said she had cycled to Dun Laoghaire to watch the sun rise.

On another occasion, he asked her to come to his family home in Dun Laoghaire. She said she felt sick because she was so nervous.