Teacher who abused boy already had multiple convictions

A 77-year-old retired teacher has been jailed for 12 months and has been placed on the Sex Offenders Register for sexually assaulting a nine year old boy over quarter of a century ago

Leo Hickey from Skevanish in Innishannon had denied eight counts of sexual assaulting Daniel Kelleher while teaching at Scoil Eoin Boys National School in Ballincollig on dates between November 1991 and June 1992.

In February, a jury at Cork Circuit Criminal Court took just an hour and five minutes to unanimously convict Hickey and this week Judge Sean O Donnabhain sentenced him to three years in jail with the final two years suspended.

Det Garda Donal O’Connell told the court that the abuse began when Mr Kelleher was aged just nine years old and Hickey was his fourth class teacher and it consisted of him touching the boy’s penis and getting the boy to touch his penis.

Det Garda O’Connell told the court that Hickey had previous convictions from 1998, when he pleaded guilty to 21 sample counts from a total of 378 charges of indecently assaulting 21 girls between 1964 and 1973, when he was principal in Dunderrow National School near Kinsale.

During the trial, Mr Kelleher told how Hickey used to send him out with notes for other teachers and then follow him out and make him go into the toilet where he would abuse him by touching his penis while he would get out his own penis and get him (the boy) to touch him. Mr Kelleher said although it lasted only a few minutes it seemed to go on forever, at the time.

This week, Mr Kelleher told the court in his Victim Impact Statement about how Hickey’s abuse had ruined his childhood with devastating impacts that continued into adulthood when he rebelled against all authority figures and began to abuse drugs until he finally told his mother.

“To this point, I had portrayed a front of being a hard man but the relief of admitting what had been done to me and reporting it to Det Garda Donal O’Connell lifted the burden of shame that led me on that awful dark road of 27 years of what was my life,” he said.

Defence barrister John Devlin BL said his client had achieved “national notoriety” over the previous case but he pointed out he had not come to garda attention since Mr Kelleher’s case and he was the primary carer for his elderly wife and he asked Judge O’Donnabhain to be as lenient as possible.

Judge O Donnabhain said that the abuse of Mr Kelleher was “disgraceful” and a shocking breach of trust by Hickey who had effectively removed any possibility of a discount by his decision to fight the case, and he sentenced him to three years in jail with the last two years suspended.