A prisoner in Mountjoy Jail who sexually assaulted a cell mate, who had sought protection from the authorities, has been jailed for four years by the Central Criminal Court.
Mr Justice Carney suspended the final year because he said he had to mark the fact that the State bore some responsibility for what had happened, by putting a "highly vulnerable" person who wanted protection into a cell with a dangerous person.
Gerard Duffy (35), of Sean MacDermott Street, Dublin, then serving an eight-year sentence for manslaughter, was convicted of the crime before Christmas by a jury which acquitted him of a second charge of raping his victim on June 28th, 1997.
Duffy had pleaded not guilty to both the rape and sexual assault charges during the two-day trial. The jury took just over two hours to return its unanimous verdicts.
Mr Justice Carney said the victim had sought protection but was put into a cell with a highly dangerous man. The court did not know much about the other two occupants of the cell.
The victim was locked up in this cell for 23 hours a day and had been plied with drugs which made him even more susceptible to what occurred. "It seems to me the State bears some responsibility for the events that happened in a set-up that should have been pretty foreseeable," the judge added.
Det Garda Barry Carolan said the 22-year-old victim, who was serving a nine-month sentence for handling stolen property and driving a stolen car when the assault happened, had been assaulted again recently.
Det Garda Carolan agreed with Mr Gregory Murphy SC, prosecuting, that there had been an incident previously in Wheatfield Prison where Duffy was found in a bed with another prisoner. Duffy had spent a considerable period of his life in prison, and his manslaughter sentence had now expired.