Courts

‘I lived in fear of this man’: Dublin man sent barrister sexual and threatening messages

Eoghan Peavoy’s threats to the woman included voicemails saying he had ‘fantasies about killing you and all your children’ and other messages of a sexually abusive nature

Eoghan Peavoy (53) of Brackenwood Avenue, Balbriggan, pleaded guilty to two counts of harassment of the woman on dates between February 8th, 2019, and August 23rd, 2022. Photograph: Collins Courts

Jessica Magee
Eimear Dodd
Fri Mar 8 2024 - 17:08

A Dublin man who sent a barrister a series of sexual and threatening messages has been told by a judge he will be shown “no sympathy” by the court if he breaches the conditions of a suspended prison sentence.

Eoghan Peavoy (53) of Brackenwood Avenue, Balbriggan, pleaded guilty to two counts of harassment of the woman on dates between February 8th, 2019, and August 23rd, 2022.

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Peavoy’s harassment took the form of text messages, emails, voicemails and WhatsApps that became increasingly more aggressive, threatening, vulgar and sinister.

Peavoy’s threats to the woman included voicemails saying he had “fantasies about killing you and all your children” and other messages of a sexually abusive nature.

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The court heard that he also made unsolicited contact with the woman’s father, several of her colleagues, and other family members.

Counsel for Peavoy said he was diagnosed with schizophrenia and harboured “psychotic grievances” against people.

In a ruling on Friday, Judge Martin Nolan said Peavoy had committed a “serious crime”, subjecting the woman to a “long period of harassment”, which was “very distressing” and “traumatic”.

Judge Nolan said Peavoy is a “danger to himself and society” when he “departs” from his medication regime, adding that while his culpability is lessened to his condition, Peavoy’s culpable behaviour was departing from his regime.

He imposed a five-year prison sentence and suspended it on strict conditions. Judge Nolan directed Peavoy to take all prescribed medications and not to leave in-patient care unless he is discharged by an appropriately qualified medical professional.

He further ordered Peavoy to have no contact with the victim, her family, or friends for the five-year period of the suspended sentence and in perpetuity afterwards.

Judge Nolan told Peavoy that if he broke any of these conditions, he would be brought back before this court and “then going to a different place”.

Det Gda David Chapman told prosecuting counsel at a previous hearing that Peavoy went to college in the early 1990s with a sister of the injured party. He began to harass this sister and went to her home address but was dealt with by a caution from the gardaí.

The woman’s sister then moved to the UK, and Peavoy began contacting the injured party from 2005 to 2009 before stopping for a significant period of no contact.

When Peavoy again began harassing the woman, she went to gardaí in February 2019 and asked for him to stop contacting her.

Gardaí contacted the accused’s father, Diarmuid Peavoy, who said his son was mentally unwell.

Gardaí visited Peavoy at his home and arrested him involuntarily under the Mental Health Act, the first of four times that he would be sectioned between 2019 and 2021.

On February 13th, 2019, Peavoy texted the woman, telling her he had delivered a package to her address at the Law Library. He also contacted a number of her colleagues.

On February 22nd, Peavoy texted the woman, asking her to engage in sexual intercourse and saying he wanted to try and have a baby with her.

He also sent emails from four different email addresses, each bearing variations of his name.

Gda Chapman said the emails were “threatening, sexually suggestive, vulgar, abusive and belittling”.

The woman got over 50 emails in a two-week period in March 2021 and was then advised by gardaí to send a single response requesting him to stop contacting her.

On April 4th, 2021, Peavoy sent the woman over 70 texts and six voicemail messages in which he used “foul and abusive language of a vulgar, sexual nature”.

Peavoy was arrested in November 2021 and admitted that he knew the contact was not wanted and that he was unable to stop contacting her without the intervention of the courts.

On February 3rd, 2022, Peavoy again left six messages on the woman’s phone in which he appeared to be intoxicated.

Gda Chapman said the messages became increasingly more aggressive, vulgar and sinister.

In a victim impact statement, which the woman read aloud in court, she said Peavoy had interfered in her life and caused her an enormous amount of distress.

“I lived in fear of this man. I lived in fear that he would do something to me or worse, to my husband, my father or my children,” she said.

The woman said a significant amount of the messages were sexual in nature and would make her skin crawl and send shivers down her spine. “They were like an assault,” she said.

“I lived in fear that he was watching me,” she said, adding that although she tried in vain to block his emails and to stop him from contacting her, “He never stopped.”

She had to get professional advice on how to block him and had to eventually remove herself from her work website, which was “professionally detrimental”.

The woman said her fear and anxiety took on “a whole new level” when she realised Peavoy was also obsessing over her husband, her father, her father-in-law and her very young children.

She said herself and her husband had to print out photos of Peavoy for their childminder and instruct her what steps to take should he show up at their door.

Ronan Munro SC, defending Peavoy, said his client wanted to make it one hundred per cent clear that this contact was unwanted and to apologise to the victim for the unwanted high volume of texts, calls, emails and voicemails.

Gda Chapman agreed with Mr Munro that when Peavoy was interviewed, he came across “as if he had multiple personalities.”

Peavoy’s father, Diarmuid Peavoy, took the stand and told the court that his son had “huge potential” and degrees from four universities in three countries.

He said in the year 2000, his son became “a different person” and became convinced of a wide range of conspiracies against him.

He said his son Eoghan was diagnosed with severe mental illness and began taking medication, leading to a period of relative stability between 2011 and 2018 when he got an internship in the Department of Foreign Affairs.

However, the court heard that Peavoy then met an American campaigner against antipsychotic drugs who persuaded him to come off his medication.

Thereafter, Mr Peavoy said, it was a rollercoaster with his son in and out of hospital in a revolving door nightmare.

“Eoghan needs to be in hospital and on medication. He needs some psychotherapy. The Health Service have let him down,” said Mr Peavoy Sr.

Mr Munro said the persistent nature of the offending was an aggravating factor, but pointed out that there was no physical harassment.

Counsel said that since August 2022, there has been “a period of peace” and that Peavoy has been involuntarily detained in the Aisling Centre of Beaumont Hospital, a secure psychiatric unit, since January 2023.

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