The jury has begun deliberating in the trial of a garda accused of possessing images and videos of children being subjected to sexual acts.
Joseph O’Connor (58), of west Dublin, has pleaded not guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to five counts of possessing child pornography at his home in west Dublin on dates between July 30th and August 2nd, 2011.
Investigators analysed a laptop taken from his home and found videos in the computer’s “recycle bin” depicting boys under the age of 10 being subjected to sexual acts. Two videos depicted boys under 17 being subjected to sexual acts with a male adult. There were also multiple copies of 16 different images of children sexually exposed or being subjected to sexual acts.
Mr O’Connor told gardaí he had never seen the material before and denied downloading it. He described it as sick and said somebody else must have downloaded the files.
He said he believed that a man, Patryk (sic) Farrell, who came to his home for sex days before the laptop was seized had corrupted his computer.
Closing the State’s case, Alice Fawsitt SC told the jury that the prosecution is not required to prove that the accused viewed or did anything with the files. She said the State must prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that the accused knew the files were on his laptop.
Virus
She said there was no evidence of any virus on the laptop and no evidence of anything that might have happened to it the weekend before it was seized.
Paul Carroll SC, defending, told the jurors they must consider if it was possible that the files were put on the computer by somebody else. He said Mr O’Connor told gardaí that hundreds of men had come back to his home for sex and that any of them could freely use his laptop.
Mr Carroll said that on July 29th Mr Farrell texted Mr O’Connor and told him he was bruised and that he was going to gardaí and he would “destroy” him.
Mr O’Connor went to gardaí to report that Mr Farrell had stolen his garda ID, handcuffs and cash from his home.
Counsel asked if it was reasonable that his client knew Mr Farrell had made allegations to gardaí and did not destroy his laptop.
After around two hours of deliberations Judge Elma Sheahan told the jury of to return to court on Wednesday.