A woman who received a fully suspended sentence for the neglect, sexual assault and exploitation of her own toddler son has lost her bid to overturn her conviction.
The Director of Public Prosecutions now intends to appeal the suspended sentence on the grounds that it was unduly lenient.
The Cork native (46), who cannot be named to protect the identity of the victim, was convicted by a jury in June 2022 of wilful neglect of the child between September 2010 to June 2015 – when the boy was between one and four-and-a-half-years-old.
She was also found guilty of sexual assault and sexual exploitation of the child on a date unknown between September 2013 and June 2015.
In December 2022, the Central Criminal Court heard that the woman, who has “very limited cognitive functioning”, does not accept the unanimous verdicts of the jury.
The woman appealed her convictions on the grounds that the charge of neglect was too vague and should have been withdrawn by the trial judge. Her lawyers argued that the trial was unfair because they were unable to properly cross-examine the child.
They said a four-and-a-half year delay between the allegations being made and the matter coming to trial meant the victim had forgotten details of the sexual abuse.
The evidence before the jury came from video-recorded interviews the victim gave to specialist gardaí when he was just six and seven-years-old. He was aged 11 by the time the trial began.
Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy gave the judgment of the three-judge court and rejected both grounds of appeal.
While particular acts of neglect were not set out, Ms Justice Kennedy said it was clear to the accused that she was being charged with wilful neglect over a period of time.
She said the charge of neglect was supported by the behaviour and presentation of the victim after he went into foster care and it would have been clear to the accused what was alleged.
The trial heard evidence from the boy's foster parents that at age five he behaved like a toddler of two or three and was unable to dress himself or sit in a chair. He could not hold a knife and fork and ate by stuffing food into his mouth, and he also ate out of bins, the court heard.
The boy was found to have no understanding of personal boundaries and was not toilet-trained.
Compelling
In late 2017, the child made disclosures to his then foster mother of sexual assault by both his mother and father.
Ms Justice Kennedy said the accounts given by the victim in his recorded interviews provided a compelling account of the sexual offences.
While the defence had taken a "tactical decision" to only engage in limited cross-examination, the judge said this did not amount to unfairness, and they could have questioned him further.
She said the defence could have further explored the significant detail provided by the garda interviews and while they could not know what answers they might receive, an unfairness does not arise. The court dismissed all grounds of appeal.
At the trial, Detective Sergeant Clare Corcoran told Lorcan Staines SC, prosecuting, that in 2004 the defendant married a man and they had seven children together, but all seven were ultimately taken into care.
The victim was just under five-years-old when he went into foster care, and has since been taken into State institutional care until he is an adult.
Trial judge Ms Justice Karen O’Connor had noted the contents of an assessment carried out by forensic psychologist Dr Patrick Randall, who said the woman had experienced significant childhood trauma. In his report, Dr Randall assessed the woman's risk of sexual reoffending as low.
Ms Justice O'Connor sentenced the woman to three years’ imprisonment, backdating it by six-and-a-half months for time already served in custody. The judge then suspended the remainder of the sentence for two years on condition the woman complies with probation and therapeutic services.
The sentence consisted of three years’ imprisonment for the charges of sexual assault and exploitation of the boy and a concurrent one year’s imprisonment on a charge of child cruelty.
The woman had pleaded not guilty to all charges.
At the trial, the boy described both his parents being present when his mother molested him, forcing him to commit sex acts upon her.
The woman did not accept the child was sexually abused and in evidence named her husband as her own father and claimed she was conceived in the back of a Garda car.
The child's father, who was the designated primary carer, was charged and prosecuted for more serious sexual offending, but died in custody before he could be brought to trial.
In his victim impact statement, the child said he continued to have nightmares of his parents coming to get him.
“When asked about good memories, I end up running to the bathroom crying. When someone calls my name, I get frightened and worried,” he said.
If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article, you can call the national 24-hour Rape Crisis Helpline at 1800-77 8888, access text service and webchat options at drcc.ie/services/helpline/ or visit Rape Crisis Help.
