We did cover up claims against sexual predator, Smyllum nun confesses

‘I now feel guilty about it’

NUNS at a children’s home hushed up sex allegations against a worker 40 years before he was convicted of similar offences, it was claimed yesterday. The Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry was told that two boys at Smyllum Park made the allegations against Brian Dailey in the 1970s.

A nun who worked there at the time told the inquiry that staff at the Lanark home were aware of the claims but it was decided to ‘let it go away’.

Dailey, 70, was jailed for ten years last July after assaulting and molesting children at three homes in the 1970s and 1980s.

According to evidence read out at the inquiry, the two children were allegedly assaulted while on holiday in the company of Smyllum staff.

The nun, referred to under the pseudonym Mary Ann, told inquiry QC Colin MacAulay that the boys had not been allowed to return to the home after refusing to withdraw their claims.

Asked if police had been informed at the time, the 73year-old said: ‘Not as far as I know. I realise how wrong it was because it was hushed. I realise now we should never have done that. At the time we just thought, “let it go away”.

‘He (Dailey) was there quite often because he was a local boy. We didn’t think anything of it. I never thought he was alone with the children but he must have been.’

Asked what role Dailey, of Edinburgh, had at the home, the sister replied: ‘None’.

Dailey was brought to justice last year when he was convicted of abusing children at Ridgepark Home in Lanark, and the Millpark Children’s Home and Ladymary School, both in Edinburgh.

He was convicted of three indecent offences against two boys and a girl, and a further two charges of assaulting the boys between 1973 and 1984.

Mr MacAulay suggested that, had the nuns acted in the 1970s, future abuse could have been prevented. Mary Ann said: ‘I now feel guilty about it. I really feel awful. It must have been awful for them.’

In November last year, Catholic order the Daughters of Charity of St Vincent de Paul, which ran Smyllum, apologised ‘unreservedly’ for failing to investigate abuse allegations involving Dailey at other homes it operated.

The inquiry also heard from Leon Carberry, who was at Smyllum in the 1950s.

He claimed a male member of staff made him perform a sex act, and accused the nuns of lying to him over the death of his brother David, four, at the home.

The inquiry, before Lady Smith, continues.