Susan McKay: Ireland must give O’Reilly sisters abuse inquiry

“This country has to wake up. The whole society needs help coming to terms with the psychology of families in which there is child abuse.” Sophia McColgan said that to me in 1997, two years after her father was sentenced to 238 years in prison for multiple instances over many years of sexual and physical abuse against Sophia and some of her siblings.

1997 was the year the UN Committee on the Protection of Children slated Ireland for its failings on multiple grounds. It was also the year Kathleen O’Reilly told gardaí that her father had been raping and abusing her.

People were moved to tears watching the RTÉ interview the O’Reilly sisters gave last week after their evidence in a five-week trial last year got their brutal father, James O’Reilly, sentenced to 20 years in prison. O’Reilly had raped and abused his sister and seven of his daughters over a 23-year period. One of his daughters had given birth to a child as a result.

It was chillingly reminiscent of a litany of other notorious cases of relentless cruelty within the institution of the family in this country

Helen O’Donoghue, the eldest of the daughters, spoke of how the sexual violence had started for her at the age of four. As she spoke, urging other women suffering such violence to come forward and not be afraid, her sisters supported her, stroking her hair, hugging her and holding each other. It was devastating to hear what they had been through, beautiful to witness their loving solidarity.

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Now these brave, magnificent women want, and must be given, an inquiry into why they were not helped, why those responsible for child protection did not intervene to rescue them.

As Helen told The Irish Times in an interview with Kitty Holland last weekend, "We were thrown to the wind, left to live or die." It was chillingly reminiscent of a litany of other notorious cases of relentless cruelty within the institution of the family in this country: the Kilkenny incest case, Kelly Fitzgerald, the McColgans, the Roscommon "house of horrors" and now the O'Reillys. And many other tragic cases in which women and children have been killed or have had their lives blighted by abuse.

What is wrong with Ireland? In 1993, the Kilkenny incest report noted that the young girl who had been repeatedly raped by her father, and had given birth to his child, had been in contact with health services on more than 100 occasions over a 10-year period before he was arrested. The report pointedly recommended a constitutional amendment on the rights of “born children”.

That year, Kelly Fitzgerald died soon after returning to England after living with her parents in Mayo. The teenager was emaciated. Her parents were later convicted of neglect. In 1996, the Kelly Fitzgerald report found that the authorities had not adequately assessed information about the family and recommended changes to the way children at risk were identified.

Ignored by system

In 1998, the report into the west of Ireland farmer case described “repeated disclosures of abuse to healthcare professionals” despite which the children were not protected. This was the McColgan case – the family later courageously waived anonymity. The children had been, the report said, “trapped in a system that was not responsive to their needs”.

In 2010, the report into the Roscommon case in which a family of children were appallingly abused by their parents, referred tellingly to the failure to learn from previous inquiries.

There is no doubt but that children in the poorest families are the least protected, and that Travellers are even more marginalised than others

And James O’Reilly continued to prey upon his family, confident he was entitled to do so, and undisturbed in this belief until 2016, when his daughters went to the gardaí in Thurles and finally got the kind of support they needed to have him prosecuted.

When Kathleen O’Reilly first spoke out to the authorities in 1997, her sisters did not corroborate her story. Similarly, the McColgan family made, then withdrew, statements, and then made them again.

We need to understand this. There is terror. Abusers have groomed and isolated their victims. There is a lack of trust that professional people will help, founded in the experience that they do not. There is the cultural tolerance of male violence against women and children.

Sophia spoke of being shunned at school, of neighbours who saw beatings but looked away. Helen turned up at her own wedding visibly injured by her father. She did not support Kathleen in 1997 because she feared her husband would leave her.

There is no doubt but that children in the poorest families are the least protected, and that Travellers are even more marginalised than others. It is not easy for society to deal with child abuse – but it is impossible for children to do so. Why can’t we learn? Why can’t we change? Wake up, Ireland.