A 39-year-old Corkman has been found guilty by a Central Criminal Court jury of attempting to rape a woman 15 years ago after breaking into her flat while she was sleeping.
The jury, which took less than three hours to reach the verdict, also found him guilty of indecent assault on the woman on October 15th, 1988 in a Cork suburb. He was found not guilty of burglary on the same occasion.
Conor Downey, of West Douglas, Cork, had pleaded not guilty to all the charges.
The jury heard during the seven-day trial that DNA samples matching those of the accused were found on the victim's underwear and fingerprints matching his were found at the crime scene.
Forensic scientist Dr Maureen Smyth had told the jury that the chances of DNA found on the underwear matching the DNA profile other than Downey's was one in a thousand million.
Downey had given blood samples to gardaí 13 years after the rape in the investigation of another crime from which he was eliminated.
Applications made by Downey's counsel to exclude the DNA evidence from the trial were rejected by trial judge Mr Justice Kevin O'Higgins who ruled it should be allowed as evidence as the samples from Downey had not been collected under false pretences, illegally or by force.
The victim had told the court on the first day of the trial that she had been sleeping in her bedroom when Downey broke into her flat and attempted to rape her. She had woken up to find him standing half-naked in front of her bed. When he left her face was "in a terrible state" and she had remained frozen in shock for about 20 minutes.
Mr Justice Kevin O'Higgins certified Downey as a sex offender and scheduled a hearing for January 13th next when a sentence date will be fixed.