Brother guilty of assaulting two children in the 1980s

A FORMER Christian Brothers teacher has been convicted of sexually assaulting two children in the 1980s.

John Gibson, 71, of Dún Laoghaire, Dublin, had pleaded not guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to two charges of indecent assault against a 12-year-old girl at a Christian Brother’s School in Co. Wexford, between May and September 1983.

During a five-day trial, a woman, now aged in her 40s, told Diana Stuart BL, prosecuting, that during school holidays in 1983 Brother Gibson asked her to paint a wall.

He told her to change into clothes he gave her and ‘specifically told me to take my underwear off’. After the painting the defendant told her to get undressed and began washing her around her private parts.

A man, now aged in his 30s, told the trial that in the summer of 1985 he agreed to help Gibson to ‘grease the goalposts’ in the school sports-field to stop children climbing them.

He said the accused then told the complainant to go into a shower and strip off. He said Gibson came in with a bottle of washing-up liquid which he used to wash the boy around his penis and buttocks.

The jury yesterday returned majority guilty verdicts on all three charges after spending just over four hours deliberating.

Judge Elma Sheahan remanded Gibson on continuing bail until his sentence hearing on March 19 next, and ordered victim impact reports.