A serial rapist who sexually attacked a woman just five months after his release in 2004 from a 10-year rape sentence has been jailed for life by Mr Justice Paul Carney at the Central Criminal Court.
erard Kelly (45), who received the 10-year sentence in November 1999, had also been jailed in 1987 for eight years in England for rape and aggravated burglary. He pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual assault of a woman on the night of September 17th-18th, 2004.
Kelly, of no fixed abode but who was living at Moreen Avenue, Sandyford, at the time, told the probation officer that he committed the crime so that he would be taken back into custody because he felt "isolated" in society and wished to return to the prison community in which he felt happier.
Kelly quickly became a suspect in this case when gardaí noted similarities to his rape of a pregnant teenager at Pearse Rovers Football Club ground, on Rochestown Avenue, on November 2nd, 1997, just three months after his return to Ireland after his English sentence.
Det Sgt Tom Forsythe told prosecuting counsel Gerard Clarke SC (with Martina Baxter) that Kelly grabbed the now 24-year-old victim while she walked to a friend's house and pushed her on to waste ground after telling her that if she made any noise he would "slice" her.
Kelly also said that if she told anyone about the incident, he would burn down her family home and gave her details to indicate he knew her address and family members. The victim offered Kelly her phone and €70 but he replied that he wanted her body and not her money. He handed her phone and money back to her when the event ended after telling her several times he was sorry. Mr Justice Carney said: "I have sympathy with the highly dysfunctional factors in his background but in the present case I would not be protecting the community by imposing anything less than a life sentence."
The probation officer's report indicated that "custody doesn't seem to be a deterrent". Kelly told the probation officer that when he drank he thought of women, meaning previous partners, who had let him down.
Mr Justice Carney noted that Kelly also told the probation officer that when he was released from the 10-year sentence he felt isolated and it was "very clear that he could not cope alone in the community".