A man who “in a shameful manner” “preyed” and raped a seven-year-old girl has been sentenced to ten years and six months in prison.
Earlier this year, a 53-year-old Slovak man was found guilty by a judge at the Central Criminal Court of rape and 12 counts of sexual assault, reports RTE.
The crimes took place on unknown dates between September 21, 2012 and September 6, 2013, when the victim was seven years old, at a home in County Wexford.
Giving verdict today, Judge Karen O’Connor said the man had “preyed on a young child in a shameful manner”, reports RTE.
Ms Justice O’Connor said the victim was staying where her father lived and it should have been a place of “safety and security” for her.
The judge noted that the man had no previous convictions for sexual offences, but had been convicted of a “serious violent offence” in another jurisdiction.
The sentences will be carried out in parallel and were dated back to July 18, 2021, when the man was taken into custody.
In an earlier hearing, the local gardai said the girl had told her mother about the abuse in 2019 and later revealed it to a guidance counselor.
She was questioned by a Gardaí specialist in December 2020 when he was 15 years old, reports RTE.
The prosecutor read out in court the girl’s statement about the influence on her.
The girl said that the man’s aggressive behavior “ruined” her childhood and adolescence. She said she suffers from anxiety, depression and self-harm, reports RTE.
The girl said she was “scared to say anything to anyone in case things got worse” and stopped going to her father’s house because of fear.
She said she did not give him an explanation at the time and her father thought she did not want to see him, adding that he was “distraught” when told the real reason.
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