63yo jailed for laneway sexual assault of teenage boy

This article contains detailed references to rape and sexual assault. Reader discretion is advised.

By Niamh O’Donoghue

A 63-year-old has been jailed for three years for sexually assaulting a teenager in a Dublin laneway.

Ronaldo Otto, aka Samantha Otto, of Grosvenor Square, Rathmines was found guilty by a Dublin Circuit Criminal Court jury last May of sexually assaulting the 18-year-old on October 26, 2022.

Oisin Clarke BL, prosecuting, said the victim wants to remain anonymous but had no issue with the defendant being named.

Reading his victim impact statement to the court, the injured party said he had just left secondary school and turned 18 at the time of the assault.

“I was forever changed after that”, he said. “I’m 21. I won’t get to be 18 again…and time waits for no one. I’ll never get that time back,” he added.

He said he hoped he could “get closure and move on with my life” and thanked gardai for getting him through a “gruelling” trial.

Garda Liam O’Meara told the court he was on duty at Rathmines Garda Station when the teenager made an allegation that he had been sexually assaulted.

The injured party said he was halfway down a lane and was wearing a set of headphones, listening to music when two females passed by.

One of the females stopped at the top of the lane and beckoned in his direction. He was not sure if he was being called because he had his headphones in.

The injured party said Otto almost immediately “cupped his penis” through his trousers. He asked Otto to back away. He moved away but Otto offered to give him oral sex and he declined. At this point the injured party took out his mobile phone and recorded some of the incident.

There was another attempt to touch him and he told Otto to go away, the court heard. The injured party said he was in shock. He called his father who was unable to attend, but his mother came to the garda station.

Gardai identified Otto from CCTV of the lane and a warrant was issued. Otto was arrested and detained in the usual fashion and was interviewed on two occasions. Otto said it was the injured party who carried out the assault and took a trial date.

The court heard Otto has one previous for assault causing harm on April 27, 2019 and received a suspended sentence on October 20, 2020. Boiling water was thrown over the injured party who had rejected Otto’s advances.

The court heard Otto is a male transitioning into a female. Judge Codd asked if the transition was complete. Gda O’Meara told the judge the transition was “not complete”.

Pieter LeVert BL, defending, told the court Otto accepted the verdict of the jury in full. He said his client is 63 and is originally from the Philippines and left school early to work.

He said his client owned and operated a salon in the Philippines. Otto came to Ireland in 2011 to work in a salon of a girl from the Philippines.

Counsel said difficulties with Otto’s vocal cords caused his client to have no voice. Having stopped working as a result of that and suffering “severe financial difficulties”, Otto began “working on the streets”. Mr LeVert said his client was a victim of a robbery and then attempted suicide.

A document from Ruhama, an NGO providing support to sex workers, which Otto first contacted in March 2014, was handed into court. A document was also handed in about attendance at adult education services and a hairdressing course.

Counsel said Otto is biologically male and has been transitioning “for a number of years” having had a breast augmentation and using a hormonal patch three times a week. Otto has diabetes and there has been “great caution because of that”.

He said there were a number of letters from the National Gender Service who provide psychological services.

Mr LeVert handed in two newspaper articles dated February 10, 2025 and May 30, 2025 written by journalist Conor Gallagher, saying there was still no formal model of how to deal with transgender prisoners and where they should be housed. Counsel said the article states these people are currently held in the E wing of Limerick Prison where they are typically held up to 23 hours a day in their cells.

“What weight has this evidence? It’s a newspaper article?” remarked Judge Pauline Codd.

Mr LeVert asked the court to take account of the issues around trans prisoners, that Otto was a foreign national with no family here and his client’s acceptance of the jury’s verdict.

The judge asked what level of English Otto had and counsel said an interpreter was used for the trial however none was used for the sentencing hearing.

Judge Codd noted Otto, who was 58 at the time of the offence, identified as female but is biologically male. The judge said that it created a difficulty in terms of sentencing as Otto has not yet received a gender recognition certificate.

The judge noted the injured party believed the person was a woman and when Otto asked him for assistance and so the complainant approached the accused. She noted Otto had claimed to be the victim and the case was fully defended. Judge Codd said the attempt to blacken the injured party’s character was unnecessary and egregious.

The judge noted the victim gave a moving account of how the assault affected him – that he should be having a good time with his friends and “feels like his life is being held up”.

Judge Codd noted it was clear from his demeanour that the injured party found the court process distressing. A sexual assault of a young person, albeit on a lower scale as it occurred over the victim’s clothing, can result in psychological harm, said the judge.

The issue of deterrence arose, said the judge, noting there was a previous assault causing harm conviction for throwing boiling water over a person who had rejected Otto’s advances.

In mitigation, the judge noted Otto grew up under difficult circumstances and there was evidence in that regard from Ruhama.

However she said these are cases where the victim feels “rightly outraged by being violated” in this manner. The judge also noted there was no guilty plea to save the victim the trauma of giving evidence.

Judge Codd said although there was no violence, the actions of the accused amounted to a “gross violation of his bodily integrity”.

The touching was aggravated by the “lewd language” that was used and that the victim was a person who was much younger.

The court heard Otto has not expressed remorse but accepted the verdict of the jury.

The previous conviction for assault causing harm was not the same type of offence but it related to rejected advances, the judge noted.

Judge Codd said Otto was now placed onto the Sexual Offenders’ Register. She said the court has a letter from Ruhama, “where they received personal support.”

She said Otto was a person undergoing transition and that it is difficult “where their gender identity does not align with their biological sex.”

Judge Codd noted Otto was on a suspended sentence at the time of the offence and imposed a three-year jail term.