By Sonya McLean
A former school teacher has been jailed for 10 years for the indecent assault of eight boys over 30 years ago at a private Dublin school.
Peter Kelly (73) of Booterstown Park, Booterstown was convicted by a Dublin Circuit Criminal Court jury following a two week trial in November.
He had pleaded not (NOT) guilty to 28 counts of indecently assaulting the boys at Willow Park School, Rock Road, Blackrock, Dublin on dates in the 70s and 80s.
The school is run by the Spiritan order of priests.
Kelly was convicted on all charges. The eight victims are now all aged in their early 50s.
Sentencing Kelly today, Judge Elma Sheahan said she was struck by the bravery of these men who she said “bared their souls” and noted the “eloquent expression of their very real hurt and torment”.
She said the injuries suffered included psychiatric issues, addiction and also the inter-generational hurt in the sense that the children and partners of these men have suffered too.
Judge Sheahan said the men had waited for decades for their stories to be heard and believed and referred to the fact that during their childhood and adolescence, many could not explain their reasons for withdrawing from their families, their inability to attend school and their various addictions.
She said that the worry and upset caused to those close to the victims is more evidence of the damage done by Kelly.
Judge Sheahan noted that many of the victims had already suffered very real or significant trauma including the loss or death of parents before she added that a number of the victims had previously been sexually abused by another teacher at the school. She said as such, these victims were “already vulnerable children”.
The judge took into account “the gruelling nature” of the trial for the victims while accepting that Kelly was entitled to “call on the State to prove the case against him”.
Judge Sheahan said the aggravating features of the case were the seriousness of the offending, the position of the accused in the lives of the victims, the breach of trust, the age disparity, the repetitive nature of the offending, the number of complainants, the vulnerability of the victims both due to their age and their own personal circumstances as well as the fact that some of the abuse took place in front of their peers.
Judge Sheahan said that in mitigation she accepted that Kelly has no previous convictions and is a frail man with many medical conditions, noting that Kelly requires ongoing oncology appointments for treatment for prostrate cancer.
She said he has lost the single greatest mitigation of a plea of guilty before acknowledging that he does not accept the verdict of the jury.
She set various different sentences for each of the offences in relation to each of the victims, ranging from 20 months to five years, before she imposed a global consecutive sentence of 10 years.
Judge Sheahan said “given the lack of acceptance on the part of the accused of the verdict, the court does not feel there is any evidential basis on which to suspend any of the sentence”.
“I hope this brings some closure to the victims,” Judge Sheahan said.
Earlier, Judge Sheahan was advised that two members of the jury panel were present in the court room for the sentence hearing.
She said given that the case was to be heard in camera and not open to the public, those members of the jury should not be in court.
“The court is always careful to be very thankful to the members of the jury for the work they have done and what they have sat through – the letter of the law would require that strictly speaking as they are no longer members of the jury they should not be in court,” Judge Sheahan said, adding “this is in no way to disregard the work they had done”.
At an earlier sentence hearing last week, Judge Sheahan heard the victim impact statements of each of the men that had been abused by Kelly. Some of the men took the stand to read their own statements while Inspector Rachael Kilpatrick read others into the record.
The men spoke of the various ways Kelly’s actions impacted their life, speaking of addictions, inabilities to deal with relationships, inabilities to express their emotions and inabilities to reach their full potential in adult life.
Some of the men have spent time in psychiatric hospitals, others have been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), many of them are on medication for anxiety and depression.
The men spoke of times in their lives when they have struggled with thoughts of suicide. They spoke of the loss of their education and suffering from insomnia, night terrors and panic attacks.
One victim spoke of an occasion as a child when he deliberately crashed his bike on the way to school. He was later treated in hospital because he had pretended he had injured his leg. He said in his victim impact statement that he did this so he could get out of school for some time and be away from Kelly.
Many of the victims spoke of how their life could have been so different had they not been abused by Kelly and how as young children they never stood a chance against him.
One of the victims spoke about how Kelly was “one cog in a machine of systematic abuse”. He said the school “tolerated widespread sexual abuse” and how “37 sexual abusers had been identified in both schools” between both Willow Park and its feeder school Blackrock College. He said as children they had “no chance”.
One of the victims told Kelly that he hopes he is made “confront the harm you have done”.
This man also stated in his victim impact statement that he hopes “the court understands how you have not only violated the law but the life of a child and everything that he might have become”.
Another victim said he was “already vulnerable, already broken” when Kelly abused him as he had been the victim of “multiple sexual crimes committed by Kelly’s colleagues”.
He said he was not abused “because I was chosen or groomed but because I was there in his classroom completely unable to protect myself”.
“He used his position, he took advantage of my vulnerability and added to my pain,” the man continued.
Insp Kilpatrick outlined the incidences of abuse committed on each of the boys, who were mostly aged between 11 and 13 years old at the time.
She said most of the abuse occurred in the classroom when Kelly would hold the child on his lap and molest them under the guise of tickling them. The victims said he would restrain them on his lap and bounce them up and down.
He also played a game called ‘The Muppet Show’ during which he would take the child under the cloak he wore as a school teacher and again tickle them and then molest them.
One of the victims was abused in the school’s rugby changing room. He described being laid across Kelly’s lap before he was abused. Others were abused in the school gym.
Andrew Sexton SC, defending, told Judge Sheahan that “there is not an acceptance of the verdict” before he added that Kelly never owned a passport. He said Kelly’s “entire life centred around the school and his home”, with his home being right beside the school.
Counsel said the school implemented its own disciplinary regime following an initial complaint in the early 2000s, which was followed by a series of suspensions and which ultimately led to the end of Kelly’s career at the school with Kelly resigning his post in 2004.
The Director of Public Prosecutions decided not to prosecute the allegations that had been made in the early 2000s.
“He suffered the cessation of his life as a teacher and it was not replaced by anything else,” Mr Sexton told the court.
Judge Sheahan said it was “very important to acknowledge that it had been a very difficult morning” for the six victims who were present in court.
She pointed out that due to the law that existed at the time of Kelly’s offending the maximum penalty available to the court in most of the charges was ten years, while two of the offences allowed a penalty of up to two years in prison.
Insp Kilpatrick told John Griffin BL, prosecuting, that a large scale investigation began in January 2021 in relation to complaints regarding sexual abuse at both Blackrock College and its adjacent primary school, Willow Park.
She agreed that Kelly taught Maths in Willow Park for a lengthy period of time.
The first victim made a statement in 2001. He said he was around 11 years old and Kelly touched his penis on a number of occasions.
He said he was abused on four occasions in the rugby changing room and once in the classroom.
This man said Kelly held him face down across his knee and slapped his bottom, before he sexually assaulted him.
The second victim was also sexually abused in the classroom. He said Kelly grabbed him, pulled him onto his lap and sat him facing the desk.
He said the teacher made it look like they were having fun before he bounced him up and down. He could feel Kelly had an erection.
The third victim said he was always sexually abused in the classroom with Kelly making him sit on his lap.
He tickled him under his jumper before he moved his hands down towards his waist and tickled his penis, testicles and anus.
Kelly made sure the child’s shirt was tucked back in properly before he allowed him to sit back down in the classroom.
This victim said the abuse happened continually throughout the year in front of the class and estimated it occurred on an almost weekly basis.
The fourth victim was abused in the school gym when he was made bend over a pummel horse before Kelly rubbed his buttocks.
This same victim was also abused during the game that Kelly called ‘The Muppet Show’ during which he was placed under Kelly’s cloak and sexually abused under that cloak.
He later told gardaí that Kelly took the advantage of the fact that no one could see under the gown and Kelly ran his hands up and down the child’s body under the guise of being tickled.
The fifth victim said ‘The Muppet Show’ was offered to him as “a choice of punishment”. He was abused by Kelly in this manner and he also abused this victim by holding him on his lap and restraining him around his waist.
Kelly sometimes referred to this as “death by tickles” and pressed his body against the child while carrying out a “frenzied tickle attack” including around the child’s genitals.
The sixth victim was abused by Kelly after he “digitally penetrated his anus” and spanked the child’s buttocks.
The seventh victim said he was sexually abused by Kelly again during ‘The Muppet Show’ and by being bounced against Kelly.
The eighth victim was also abused in the front of the class on at least five occasions. He said it was a humiliating ritual that Kelly put the children through.
Insp Kilpatrick confirmed that Kelly had no previous convictions, has abided by his bail conditions and has not come to any further garda attention.