A BOY who was 15 when he raped a girl at a teenage house party in Dublin last year is to be sentenced at the Central Criminal Court next week.
The boy, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, pleaded guilty to raping the then 15-year-old girl in a bedroom on March 5th, 2011. He has no previous convictions.
Mr Justice Paul Carney remanded the boy in custody for sentencing next week.
Seán Gillane SC, defending, submitted that the Children Act 2001 indicated that a period of detention should only be imposed on a child as a measure of last resort and only when the court was satisfied there was no other way to deal with the child.
The girl said she had found preparing a victim impact statement difficult. “I did not ask for any of this and I really want it to be over,” she said in the statement which was read in court.
She said it still felt as if the offence had happened yesterday. She described how she had been in shock for weeks afterwards and had suffered panic attacks.
The girl said she had asked her parents if they could move out of the area as she could see things which reminded her of the attack. She said she had also suffered health problems.
Garda Adrian O’Sullivan told John Quirke, prosecuting, that the girl and boy had attended a teenage house party. The group had put €5 each in to buy alcohol and about 20 people were at the house, approximately aged between 15 and 19 years old.
During the evening the young woman drank four bottles of Budweiser and was noticed to be becoming drunk. She went upstairs to a bedroom at about 2am to go asleep.
The girl said the accused boy came into the room shortly afterwards and pulled down her trousers. She said she told him to stop and he told her, “This is what you want.” The girl said she was crying and calling her friends but the music in the house was very loud.
The boy had sex with her despite her telling him to get away. The girl said she was in pain and did not know how long it lasted.
Afterwards the boy pulled up his trousers and left.
Immediately afterwards other teenagers at the party became aware that something was wrong and went to the next-door neighbour’s house to fetch an adult.
The neighbour told gardaí a girl had knocked on her door at about 4am and asked her to come to the house.
She said the victim told her the boy had forced himself on her but she did not wish to tell her mother because she was afraid she would be angry at her for drinking.
The woman took the girl into her house and rang the Rape Crisis Centre and a community garda.
The neighbour rang the girl’s parents and her husband went to the boy’s parents’ house to let them know what had happened. The woman said the boy told her that if he had done anything to the girl, he was sorry.
Later that day the accused boy and his parents attended at a local Garda station.
The boy told gardaí he had sex with a girl at the party the night before and initially said he did not know if she had consented. He later admitted that the girl had said “no”. Gardaí asked him if he had taken advantage of the girl or thought she would not struggle and he said “yes”.
He agreed he was at least reckless as to whether or not she had consented.
Garda O’Sullivan agreed with Mr Gillane that the offence had a terrible effect on the young victim.
He agreed that the accused boy was at the Garda station with his parents shortly before the girl came in to make her statement.
He agreed that the boy initially had some difficulty in indicating what happened but ultimately told gardaí the girl had said stop and did not consent.
Garda O’Sullivan agreed that the boy was “an ordinary young fellow” who had never been on the Garda radar.
Mr Gillane said that the boy wished to indicate he recognised the harm he had done to the victim.
He said the boy was from a good hardworking family who had taken the case “by the scruff of the neck” from the start.