Aine Adams retracted initial evidence against father, court told

An alleged victim of child sexual abuse retracted initial evidence she gave to the police because she believed they were more interested in learning about Gerry Adams - brother of her alleged abuser, Belfast Crown Court was told today.

In the court today the jury was shown a video of evidence Aine Adams gave against her father, Liam Adams in 2006.

Liam Adams (58) from Bernagh Drive in west Belfast denies ten charges against him involving his daughter Aine - three or rape, three of gross indecency and four of indecent assault. It is alleged the assaults took place over a six year period beginning in 1977 when Aine Adams was aged four.

The prosecution outlined how in 1986 Aine Adams told her mother Sarah of the alleged abuse. In early 1987 they went to the RUC to make formal allegations against her Liam Adams.

Subsequently, however, Aine Adams retracted that evidence because the family felt the police were more interested in learning information about Gerry Adams, then Sinn Fein MP for West Belfast, than in the actual abuse, the court was told.

“Police were more interested in who he was,” Ms Adams told a woman police officer in the interview that was recorded in 2006.

Explaining why she went to a police station to withdraw this evidence she said, “I felt it was safer for us to leave it.”

Ms Adams, now aged 40, said that she confronted her father about the abuse in Donegal in 1987. She was in the company of her mother and the Sinn Fein president Mr Adams at the time, she said. Her father denied her allegations, she added.

Ms Adams said that she had always wanted Liam Adams to admit the abuse to help her achieve some form of “closure”.

Ms Adams said she was prompted to make her allegations to the police in 2006 when she was an adult because of her concerns for a young daughter Liam Adams had in a second relationship - his marriage to Sarah was long broken at that stage. “I could not take the fact he had a wee daughter,” she said.

She said she was worried about the young girl. “I was doing it more or less to protect his wee daughter,” she said.

Ms Adams also said that her father sent her an envelope containing £150. She did not want it and “tore it up”, she said.

She then put the pieces in an envelope which she brought to Gerry Adams’ house. She had written him a note saying she “did not want any money from Liam”.

The case continues.