A judge has told a businessman he is "delusional" after he made "dreadful" allegations that his ex-partner was a member of swingers' sex club.
At a Family Law District Court, the judge granted the woman a two-year Safety Order against her ex-partner, arguing 80 texts he sent her in a single one night constituted harassment on his part.
The judge dismissed a Safety Order application made by the man against his ex-partner after he told the court he was not in fear of her.
The woman's solicitor said part of the man's grounds for seeking the Safety Order were "false allegations" that his client had pressured him to join swingers' parties.
The judge said the businessman "is persisting in saying that she is a sex addict and doing this, that and the other. I don’t really care about that - that doesn’t sway my mind one bit."
The judge noted the woman has a young child with the man and works full-time. "Good luck to her if she has time for loads of sex, but I am saying that it is highly unlikely," the judge added.
In evidence, the woman denied that she was ever in a swingers' club, adding the false allegations had dragged her name through the mud in her local community.
The couple split up last year due to the man’s cocaine problem, and he admitted to the judge that he had spent €600 on cocaine some weeks. However, he told the court he no longer uses drugs, having spent time in rehab.
Accusations
The woman said her former partner accused her of having affairs and "sleeping with the carpenter working in the house".
"He got it into his head that I was in a swingers club. He threatened that if I didn’t come clean about being in a swingers' club that he was going to tell my parents that I was a swinger and in sex clubs."
The woman said a woman she knows through work was open about being in a swingers' club and she had mentioned this to her then-partner.
"He was paranoid about me being in a swingers' club and he made contact with this woman.
"He was trying to coerce her to saying that she had seen me at one of these parties, and also went as far as joining the page himself to see if I was on it."
The woman said her ex-partner had also contacted her parents claiming she was "into swingers" and "having same-sex affairs", both of which the woman denied.
"He was then convinced I was this half-naked girl on the [swingers] site and sent that picture of the half-naked girl to my father and said that was me," she added.
The man initially made the allegation that the woman was involved in swingers' parties at a preliminary family law court hearing earlier this year.
"My name has been dragged through the mud because of these false accusations," the woman said, adding: "I never did any of the things he said, but I paid the price with it all in the newspapers."
In court, the woman's solicitor read out a newspaper headline covering the court hearing earlier this year, which read: 'Businessman claims ex pressured him into joining swingers' parties'.
The judge questioned how the woman had been identified, given in-camera rules apply to family law proceedings, to which the solicitor replied: "It got out in the community, and we wonder how it got out in the community."
Counsel added: "Unfortunately, it has caused an awful lot of embarrassment to my client and her family."
The judge said the man was "delusional", having made "dreadful allegations about his ex being involved in swinging".
"From the point of view of a rational human being, I cannot explain your conduct," the judge said, adding he had shown no evidence of "emotional sobriety".
The man's solicitor said the woman's Safety Order application against his client amounted to "character assassination", however, to which the judge responded: "It is not."
The judge also ruled the man can have supervised access to his child on condition he provides clean drug tests.
