WOMAN SEXUALLY ASSAULTED ‘Sex addict’ nurse spared jail after groping co-worker

HE BOASTED OF ‘THREESOMES’ DURING DRIVE

A SENIOR nurse has been spared jail for groping a co-worker in his car after “persistently” offering the woman a lift and boasting about threesomes.

Leonard Iliuta (36) told the victim he was “a sex addict” and questioned her about her love life before touching her on her thigh and toward her vagina several times, Dublin District Court heard. He pleaded not guilty to sexually assaulting the healthcare worker during the incident, which happened within the past five years.

However, Iliuta, of Seaview Mews, Seatown west, Dublin, was convicted following a non-jury hearing before Judge John Hughes, who found his denials were “not credible”.

After hearing a mitigation plea and noting the victim’s impact statement, he imposed a fourmonth sentence, suspended on the condition that Iliuta did not reoffend in the next two years. He must remain on supervised probation and attend an offence-related treatment course.

Judge Hughes also ordered him to pay the woman €2,000 compensation.

The woman told the sentence hearing it was “like carrying a ton of bricks, and it has been put down”. Defence counsel Garrett Casey told the court his client did not accept the verdict. He said the father of two was from Romania but came to Ireland nine years ago and worked as assistant director of nursing.

Earlier, the woman told the court she usually left work before Iliuta to avoid his “quite persistent” offers of a lift in his car. On the day of the incident, she “reluctantly” accepted.

During the journey the “conversation shifted to a kind of sexual nature”.

The woman said: “He stated that he was a sex addict and there was nothing he had not done, including cheating on his girlfriend, threesomes and that he had previously been with a man.”

Touched

She said Iliuta “put his hand on my left knee” and then every time he touched her leg, his hand lingered, and it started to go close to her vagina.

She asked to get out so she could walk but she said he pulled her legs back to him.

When they reached her home, he asked if there was anyone in. She told him someone was always there, but he “insinuated his house was free”.

The woman remembered being “fairly shaken up” when she entered her home and immediately told her flatmate what happened. She then notified gardai and her employer.

Iliuta, who had no prior criminal convictions, claimed to have been shocked when he learned of the allegations, saying it was defamation.