A former US marine who molested his niece when she was a child has been sentenced to 12 years at the Central Criminal Court.
He appeared in court yesterday with severe facial injuries. His lawyer said he had been beaten in prison after other inmates discovered the nature of his offences. Counsel asked the judge to take this into account when sentencing.
Eamonn McCall (40), who is originally from Carlow, started abusing the girl when she was seven years old. His victim earlier told the Central Criminal Court that she wanted the accused named so “the world can know he is a child abuser”.
McCall, with an address on North Circular Road, Dublin, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting the girl and attempting to rape her in her family home in Carlow town between April 1990 and December 1993.
Harrowing
Mr Justice Paul Carney said the woman's victim impact report was "one of the most harrowing ever received by this court".
He said the aggravating factors in the case were the multiple instances of abuse, the age disparity involved and “in particular” the effect on the victim.
Mr Justice Carney imposed a 12-year term but suspended the final two years after taking into account McCall’s early guilty plea and relative youth at the time of offending.
McCall’s victim told gardaí that the first incident of sex abuse occurred before her Holy Communion in 1990. McCall was then about 16 when he abused the girl in the family bathroom of her home by forcing her to perform oral sex on him. She also described a “particularly violent and aggressive” attempted rape.
Robbed
In her impact report the victim said McCall had robbed her of her right to live in her home town because she could only bear to spend a few nights there, acknowledging that if it were not for her parents she would never go back.
She spoke of her rage and described it as “useless anger” over what McCall had done to her.
“I still feel so angry. I hate him. He is a cancer in the world. I wish he would do everyone a favour and go away and die. He has shown no remorse, no contrition.”
She said that her counselling with the Rape Crisis Centre has kept her alive and saved her life.
Garda Niall Maloney told Derek Cooney, prosecuting, that the victim first made the allegations to gardaí in 2010 and McCall was arrested in June 2012. He was interviewed twice and made admissions.
Mary Rose Gearty SC, defending, said her client had served in the US marines for over four years. She asked the court to take into account that his only previous conviction was for a minor theft.