Convicted rapist to serve additional time for breaching terms of suspended sentence

By Eimear Dodd and Claire Henry

A convicted rapist handed an 11-year sentence last month for harassing three female journalists has been told he will spend an extra ten months in prison.

Mark McAnaw (53), previously of Letterkenny, Co Donegal, was before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court for breaching the conditions of a suspended sentence.

He pleaded guilty last month to harassing three female journalists in August 2023.

At that time, McAnaw was under the suspended portion of a sentence for an aggravated burglary, committed in 2018.

In June 2023McAnaw received a sentence of eight years and four months, backdated to when he went into custody in 2018, for the aggravated burglary.

The final 16 month of this sentence was suspended for 16 years on strict conditions.

McAnaw was released from custody on this sentence in July 2023, several weeks before the harassment of the three journalists took place.

He was before Dublin Circuit Criminal Court on Friday for a hearing in relation to the activation of the suspended portion of the 2023 sentence.

Judge Martin Nolan was told that the application to re-activate the suspended portion of the sentence had been triggered by McAnaw breaching the conditions of the suspension.

These were his convictions for the harassment of the three journalists and a separate District Court conviction for a breach of the Sex Offenders’ Act.

Rebecca Smith BL, defending McAnaw, said her client was homeless following his release from custody and struggled to access medication he had been on.

McAnaw also found it difficult to abide by the conditions imposed, counsel said.

The judge noted he could activate none, all or part of the suspended portion of the 2023 sentence, which would run consecutive to the 11-year sentence imposed on McAnaw last month.

Judge Nolan said McAnaw had committed “rather serious offences” following his release from custody in 2023, which had already been dealt with by another judge.

Having considered the totality principle, Judge Nolan reactivated 10 months of the 16 months suspended portion of the 2023 sentence and directed it to run consecutively to the 11-year sentence McAnaw is currently serving.

Last month, Judge Pauline Codd handed McAnaw an 11-year sentence for the harassment of Nicola Tallant, Amanda Brunker and Deirdre Reynolds.

The court heard McAnaw repeatedly sent the three women emails and messages of a violent and sexually threatening nature, which escalated to him threatening to put a “bullet” in one of them.

He also referred to himself as an “IRA Top Boy”.

He also turned up at the offices of the Sunday World on Talbot Street and, when refused entry, he went to a cafe across the road.

When gardai approached him there, McAnaw was in the process of writing an email to Ms Tallant.

McAnaw is currently detained in the Central Mental Hospital (CMH). McAnaw does not accept his diagnosis of schizophrenia and has declined to take medication, the court was told.

His previous convictions include rape, kidnapping and for assaults causing actual bodily harm from a court in Northern Ireland.

McAnaw refused to enter a bond before the court last month, which would have suspended the final 12 months of the 11-year sentence imposed.

After imposing the 11-year sentence, Judge Codd ordered that McAnaw should have no contact either directly or indirectly with the women, should not approach them, go within 10 miles of their homes and workplaces or communicate with them for life.