Abuse left off McClean school file despite boys’ complaints
John McClean thought he had his victims’ silence but a cache of school records helped convict him, writes
THE personnel file on John McClean from Terenure College gave the former English teacher and rugby coach a clean bill of health, despite numerous complaints of child abuse against him.
The file, held by the Carmelite Order, contained no record of at least three complaints made to two principals at the fee-paying school.
Gardaí sought his personnel record to check for details of complaints, but found nothing of “evidential value”.
McClean (76) was jailed for eight years last week for sexually abusing 23 pupils over 17 years.
He was hired as director of rugby by UCD Rugby Club after being asked to leave Terenure College in 1996. In a statement, the club said his crimes were “abhorrent”.
It is understood an individual associated with UCD is believed to be among halfa-dozen people who submitted character references on McClean’s behalf.
Detective Inspector Jason Miley said McClean’s victims overcame enormous personal distress to provide statements.
“It was our privilege to be able to assist them and help them, not only as guards but as investigators and as humans. We were able to help them get some form of finality. It’s been a long journey.”
JOHN McClean sat in the interview room at Terenure Garda Station in Dublin, his solicitor by his side, rationalising why the things he was being accused of could never have happened. Implausible, he would suggest, or improbable.
When photographs from the Terenure College Annual or from the student registration cards kept by the school were pushed towards him, he would shake his head. No, he didn’t recognise the boys.
Denial had served the former English teacher and rugby coach well up to then. The shame and the trauma he had inflicted on his schoolboy victims ensured most of them kept their silence into adulthood.
In that interview room, he maintained the characteristic stern demeanour and upright gait that cloaked his rampant paedophilia.
But after five decades, the walls of silence that protected him were crumbling.
John McClean (76) was a former Terenure College boy raised in an elegant red-brick in Casimir Avenue in Harold’s Cross nearby. When he graduated as a teacher in 1966, aged 21, he got a job teaching English at his old alma mater while living at home with his mother.
The abuse was outlined in evidence and in 23 victim impact statements read in court over two days in harrowing, unrelenting detail.
How he touched them through their clothes, under the guise of punishing them, or of fitting them for costumes for school plays, bringing them to tears with threats, then touching them under the pretence of comforting them.
His litany of shame included the 12-year-old he clamped between his legs, pressing him up against his erect penis, while reading an essay out to class.
The 13-year-old in second year at school, who was so traumatised by the abuse he left school in fifth year but was in his 40s when he finally sought counselling.
A 12-year-old who was called out of class for a costume fitting, ordered to remove his clothes and put on a pink dress. McClean then molested the boy, got on top of him on the floor and gyrated against him saying: “Does your daddy do this to you?”
The 16-year-old he molested during a costume fitting, starting out by tickling him then touching and rubbing up against him. The 17-year-old vulnerable teenager he took advantage of and abused, and whom he dropped from the rugby team.
Their victim impact statements told of educations interrupted or destroyed — several dropped out of school altogether as a result of the abuse — and relationships impossible or damaged by the gross betrayal of trust.
Damien Hetherington, who was abused by McClean in a classroom in first year, said “the dogs in the street” knew about McClean. He said rumours had circulated about McClean for years.
But in the mid-1990s, as McClean’s victims embarked on their adult lives carrying the burden of the irrevocable damage he had caused, McClean flourished.
As far as former pupils knew, he left Terenure College in 1996 to pursue a rugby career.
He was recruited as the director of rugby at UCD. He had coached Leinster in Australia in 1995, was assistant coach to the Ireland Schools side that toured Australia in July and August that year.
In an interview some years ago, rugby development coach Lee Smith explained how UCD set up a rugby academy and hired McClean as director of rugby using funds raised at an annual dinner in O’Reilly Hall in UCD.
When McClean retired as director of rugby in 2011, the club tweeted: “John McClean presented with an award tonight. A great Director of Rugby and a foundation stone of the modern club.”
He continued to pop up at games after he left. Rugby correspondents saw him on the sideline at games, one as recently as 2017. But time was running out for McClean.
In 2016 a former pupil made a formal statement of complaint against McClean at Terenure Garda Station. McClean was interviewed and denied the allegations and the DPP directed no charge in the case.
In March 2018, McClean was named as an abuser in Village Magazine in an article by journalist Gemma O’Doherty, who more recently attracted controversy as an anti-immigration campaigner and legal challenger of the Government’s Covid-19 restrictions. That led to more victims coming forward.
In 2018, Jason Miley, then a detective sergeant, transferred on promotion to Terenure Garda Station and took on the file of complaints about McClean. The name meant little to Jason Miley, who admitted he was not a rugby man. With his policeman’s eye and a track record of historic child abuse cases, he saw allegations of serious crimes perpetrated against several victims. The investigation progressed. Detectives spoke to those who had made statements. Those witnesses led to others.
The Terenure College Annual proved an essential corroboration tool. It contained photographs of every pupil, dates they were at school and, crucially, details of drama productions at which McClean was alleged to have abused boys. “A lot of these victims never told their partners, never told their parents, thought they would never be believed,” said Detective Inspector Miley. “Whatever amount of time was needed with a victim, we would spend that time.”
Not all of McClean’s victims wanted to make formal statements of complaint. Detectives tracked down one witness who had been brave enough to report McClean to a class prefect in 1979. He was one of two boys who had at that time accused McClean of molesting them during costume fittings. He was reluctant to make a formal complaint against McClean but the other boy did. Ultimately their complaints led to the principal meeting their parents and McClean being sidelined from the costume fittings.
The Garda investigation was unable to establish whether the principal confronted McClean about the abuse or whether McClean admitted it. The former principal, who is now elderly, was unable to provide an account of his dealings with McClean. McClean flatly denied the complaints were ever put to him in 1979.
McClean’s personnel file, which the gardaí obtained from the Carmelite Order, included not a single written record of complaints made about McClean down through the years.
“There was nothing of evidential value in his file,” said Det Insp Miley. But detectives did uncover the truth of his departure from the school.
Fr Robert Kelly, who was Provincial of the Carmelites at that time, told detectives a good friend of his had come to him with an allegation that his son had been abused by McClean. Fr Kelly acted on his friend’s complaint.
The court heard how there were several meetings that summer with McClean, after which he was told he would not be returning to teaching after the summer break.
Fr Kelly wrote a note to the boy’s father informing him that McClean had admitted the allegation. He could not remember writing that but told detectives, “if it is in the notes, it’s true.”
UCD Rugby Club issued a one-line statement following McClean’s sentencing but did not answer questions on the circumstances of his appointment. “The crimes committed by John McClean are abhorrent and the devastation that
‘The Terenure College Annual proved essential’
‘It was our privilege to assist them to get some form of finality’
his actions caused to so many people is unforgivable.”
One source said the club received no complaints about him and the first it knew of the allegations was when they were aired in the media. The source was unable to say whether McClean came to UCD Rugby with a reference.
UCD said it was unaware of his crimes, had received no complaints and is “appalled” by the abuse.
The Carmelites and Terenure College apologised and admitted failing in their duty to protect the children.
More than half a dozen people wrote character references for McClean. It is understood a serving or former staff member at UCD wrote a reference in a personal capacity. The contents were not read into the record but the court heard they mentioned his contribution to rugby, and caring for his elderly brother, before he passed away.
In court last week, McClean sat through proceedings with his hand splayed across the side of his face or his head bowed almost to his knees, as though hiding from his victims, while his counsel argued for a deferral of his imprisonment so McClean could get the Covid vaccine. Many victims never thought they would see the day come.
“I almost felt pity for him,” one victim, Damien Hetherington, told the Sunday Independent. “I thought, ‘You got yourself into this, you’re sitting here in front of all these people’, and he has no one but himself to blame.”
The victims were commended by Judge Pauline Codd for their bravery. Their statements spoke of their trauma but also their survival.
According to Insp Miley, listening to that harrowing detail was difficult even for detectives.
“We had done so much and were so close to the end, and the statements were a reminder of the pain and anguish the victims had gone through,” he said.
“It was our privilege to be able to assist them and help them not only as guards but as investigators, as humans, that we were able to help them get some form of finality. It’s been a long journey.”
The investigation into historic child sexual abuse is ongoing at Terenure Garda Station. Det Insp Miley urged anyone with information to come forward. “I can assure them they will be treated professionally and in confidence and their complaint will be investigated.”