Gardaí suspect former international swimming coach Derry O’Rourke abused significantly more victims than those who have come forward so far to expose him as a serial offender.
The now 78-year-old was jailed on Wednesday for 10 years by Ms Justice Melanie Greally at the Central Criminal Court for the rape and indecent assault of a girl over nine months from October 1989. His victim, a young swimmer, was aged 13 and 14 years at the time. It was the fifth time O’Rourke was sentenced by the courts for child sexual abuse.
The girl, now a woman in her 40s, was going through a difficult period in her life when O’Rourke picked her out from an open swim class where he was working at the time, telling her she “had potential”. He offered to coach her, specifically to groom her for abuse.
Gardaí are now hopeful other victims will come forward. In the cases to date there have been at least 19 victims, who were abused over two decades from 1970 to 1992.
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O’Rourke, who went to the 1980 Moscow Olympics as an Irish team coach, is one of three sexual predators whose crimes against young athletes contributed to the collapse of the Irish Amateur Swimming Association (IASA) in the 1990s.
George Gibney, also a national team coach, fled Ireland in 1993 amid sex crime allegations. Frank McCann, a vice-president of the IASA, murdered his wife Esther and 18-month-old foster daughter Jessica in 1991 in an arson attack on their home. He did not want them to find out he had sexually preyed on, and abused, a child swimmer, who had become pregnant.
Ms Justice Greally yesterday sentenced O’Rourke following his conviction by unanimous jury verdict of one count of rape and 11 counts of indecent assault of the victim between 1989 and 1990. A Garda investigation began after the woman made a complaint in 2021.
Ms Justice Greally told O’Rourke his late apology “rings hollow”, after his not guilty pleas necessitated a trial. She said O’Rourke had “groomed” the girl, telling her to train alone in the swim lane closest to the changing rooms. The first sign of the abuse to come was O’Rourke watching the girl in the shower and this progressed to raping her, telling her she was a “good girl” but to “be quiet” and not to tell anyone. From the day she was raped, the girl stopped swimming.
Ms Justice Greally jailed O’Rourke for 10 years for rape and for 40 months for a series of indecent assault charges. On the remaining two indecent assault charges, she sentenced him to five years for each. All of the sentences will run concurrently.
The sentencing took place 24 hours after O’Rourke’s victim addressed him directly in her victim impact statement to the court, telling him: “You took so much that was not yours to take and nothing will ever give it back.”
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O’Rourke (78), a father of six with an address at Bailieboro, Co Cavan, was first jailed for 12 years in 1998 for 29 offences against 11 girls between 1976 and 1992. In August 2000, he was sentenced to four years on 19 charges involving six girls aged between 10 and 19, for crimes from 1970 to 1992.
In January 2005, O’Rourke was jailed for 10 years after admitting two charges of rape and two counts of indecent assault on dates between 1975 and 1978 in relation to the victim.
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