A FORMER county council worker and farmer has been found guilty at the Circuit Criminal Court in Tralee of sexually abusing four girls.
The assaults were on girls between the ages of about 10 and 14 from 2003 to 2008.
John O’Connell (59), Killaly, Castleisland, Co Kerry, who worked in the water services department of Kerry County Council, had denied all 29 charges relating to sexual assaults.
Seventeen charges related to one victim, eight to a second, three to the third and there was one charge involving a fourth girl.
One of the assaults took place in the county council van he used to read water meters, the prosecution alleged.
O’Connell had denied that one of his victims had written in water meter readings in his diary in the summer of 2003, even though he had admitted this to gardaí when he was arrested in 2010.
He said his handwriting would change because of the difficulty of having to write in the readings in a crouched position.
The majority verdict was brought in yesterday after more than six hours of deliberation in the trial, which had entered a third week.
There were emotional scenes with the father of some of the victims breaking down and clinging to his daughters as the guilty verdicts were brought in.
Now young women, they were also in tears.
There were also dramatic scenes while the jury was deliberating, which could not be reported on until now.
Just after 2.40pm on Thursday, Denis Vaughan Buckley SC, defending, reported receiving an anonymous call seconds earlier on his mobile phone.
Mr Vaughan Buckley said it was about an alleged connection between a juror and one of the victims and saying words to the effect that justice had to be done.
Judge Carroll Moran asked gardaí to carry out an investigation and he imposed reporting restrictions.
After most of the verdicts had been reached yesterday, the judge questioned the jurors and they told him there were no links to the complainants.
O’Connell, the owner of a 50-acre farm and a separated father of one, had no previous convictions.
He had denied all charges at all stages and had described at least one of the victims as a liar in interviews with gardaí.
It was put to the father of some of the complainants by Brian McInerney, defending, that he had issued civil legal proceedings to get money off O’Connell and that he had previously told O’Connell, “I’ll have all your money yet.”
In the witness box, the father said he would give all his own money away if it could undo what O’Connell had done to his daughters.
Cross-examined by barrister Tom Rice, prosecuting, and examined by Mr Vaughan Buckley, O’Connell repeatedly denied the abuse, saying over and over again: “I never, ever sexually assaulted those girls.”
He also denied waiting outside the house of some of the victims after primary school or of being in their house when their parents were out.
The girls had said they were afraid and ashamed to tell anyone and their close friends still did not know what had happened to them. It was 2009 before most of them spoke out.
O’Connell was remanded in custody and the judge adjourned sentencing until April 20th.
Vera O’Leary, the director of the Kerry Rape Crisis and Sexual Abuse Centre, welcomed the jury’s verdict and urged victims to come forward and report what were serious crimes.