Rapist jailed for sexually assaulting Dart passenger

A rapist who was said to pose an indefinite danger to women has been jailed for 18 months for the sexual assault of a woman on the Dart.

Paul Moore (51) has been jailed six times for sexual offences over the last 25 years.

He had been on bail awaiting sentencing for the offence.

Moore, of Mountjoy Square, Dublin, had previously pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to sexually assaulting the woman on the Dart on August 28th, 2014.

On Thursday, Judge Melanie Greally sentenced him to three-years' imprisonment, but suspended the final 18 months on strict conditions.

These included that he remain under Probation Service supervision for 10 years and that he advise his monitoring officer and gardaí of any proposed change of address or mobile phone number.

He must also remain alcohol- and intoxicant-free when in public and address his alcohol use.

The judge said that a report from the Probation Service noted that Moore had expressed no remorse for his actions, had proved resistant to all efforts to rehabilitate him and posed an indefinite danger to adult females.

She said alcohol was a major contributing factor in his offending.

Previously, the court heard Moore assaulted the victim, an au pair, in 2014 as she was travelling home from college.

Gardaí examined CCTV footage of the incident, but Moore was not identified on the video until two years later.

In the meantime, he sexually assaulted two women in separate incidents in the city centre after stopping them in the street and asking them for a cigarette.

In 2015, he was jailed for 15 months for these attacks. He was released in April 2016 and was subject to probation supervision.

In the 2015 case, Judge Martin Nolan noted that Moore "has a predisposition to violence towards women which manifests as rape and sexual assault".

Moore’s other offences include raping a musician in 2001, for which he received 10 years in prison, and raping another woman in 1995, for which he received seven years.

Defence

At a hearing in February, Moore's defence counsel, Breffni Gordon BL, said Moore had spent a significant portion of his life in prison.

Counsel said there were conflicting opinions on what caused Moore to commit these crimes.

One psychiatric report blamed a head injury he received in 1982, while another blamed an “organic personality disorder”.

Mr Gordon had asked the court to hear from Moore’s case officer in the Probation Service to see if Moore could “deal with his problems” without going to prison.

At that hearing, Ms Justice Greally said Moore’s inability to desist from offending, no matter what punishment was imposed, was a matter of real concern to the court.

She said the court was sentencing Moore for this offence and not for past offences, for which he had already served sentences.

She said the legal system in the State did not allow for preventative detention, regardless of how compelling the argument might be.