In a rare civil action seeking damages for rape, the High Court has awarded €500,000 damages against a Dublin man for the rape and sexual assault of a young woman, writes Mary Carolan.
The court had earlier frozen an award of €100,000 in damages and legal costs made to the same man, Michael Whelan, in July last when he sued Dublin Bus for injuries sustained when a wild horse he was riding along Neilstown Road collided with a bus.
Whelan (23), of St Mark's Gardens, Clondalkin, is currently serving a six-year sentence imposed in March 2002 for the rape and sexual assault of the woman near Balgaddy Park, Clondalkin, on November 7th, 1999.
After Whelan was convicted and sentenced, the woman initiated civil proceedings for damages in the High Court against him.
She obtained judgment against him in default of appearance and the court decided that the amount of damages be assessed. At a hearing earlier this month, Mr Justice De Valera assessed the amount as 500,000.
Earlier, in July 2002, in a settlement approved by Mr Justice De Valera, Whelan secured €75,000 damages and legal costs of €25,000 against Dublin Bus.
He then claimed that, when he was 14 years of age, he suffered brain and eye injuries when the horse he was riding along Neilstown Road collided with a bus. He said he had mounted the horse and was riding it when it started galloping. Then the collision happened.
The court heard Whelan was knocked unconscious and that a brain scan had shown a frontal lobe contusion. He also had a compound depressed skull fracture, was left with double vision and was hampered in his schoolwork.
After the award was approved in favour of Whelan, lawyers for the woman took proceedings to freeze the award and secured injunctions restraining the damages amount being paid out to him.
The award against Whelan follows a record jury award of €600,000 made earlier this year against a Wexford man for his repeated sexual assault and abuse of a young woman.
On February 17th last, a jury of seven men and five women made the €600,000 award to the woman, now in her mid-20s, against Simon Murphy, of The Hollow, Ramsgrange, Co Wexford.
In 2002, Murphy was sentenced to eight years in prison on a number of counts of sexual abuse of the plaintiff and for other offences. Two of the eight years were suspended but Murphy is still in prison.
The woman was repeatedly sexually abused between 1990 and 1995 when she was aged between 12 and 17.
The jury was told Murphy admitted he sexually abused the plaintiff and that the only issue it had to decide was the amount of damages.
The case was one of the first of its kind to come before the courts and the award was the biggest made by a High Court jury in a civil action.