IRELAND
Irish Examiner
By Liam Heylin
A normal middle-class teenager’s life collapsed around him when a priest sexually assaulted him in the sick bay of a boarding school in 1979 and returned moments afterwards with a Disprin and a glass of water.
This victim of Tadhg Ó Dálaigh, aged 71, of Woodview, Mount Merrion Avenue, Blackrock, Dublin, and another victim of the priest both told yesterday of attempting suicide as a result of feelings of self-loathing after the sexual abuse.
The abuse in the sick bay was denied by Ó Dálaigh but a jury found him guilty earlier this year. In a statement read by investigating officer Sgt Ann Marie Guiney yesterday, this victim described how the abuse had affected him.
His said his last happy memory was sitting in a friend’s bedroom aged 16 without a care in the world listening to Genesis’ ‘Follow You, Follow Me’. His next memory was of going to boarding school at Coláiste An Chroí Naofa, Carraig Na Bhfear, Co Cork, and waking up on a Sunday night at Easter 1979 in the sick bay of the school being masturbated by the priest until he ejaculated. He pretended to sleep until it was over because he went into deep shock. He sat up afterwards. Ó Dálaigh then went away and came back with a glass of water and a Disprin for the sick boy.
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