Derry O’Rourke, a former Irish Olympic swimming coach, has been found guilty of raping and sexually assaulting a teenage girl more than three decades ago.
O’Rourke, 78, was a convicted rapist prior to this trial, having received sentences in 1998, 2000 and 2005.
In this case, O’Rourke had pleaded not guilty to one count of rape and 15 counts of indecent assault between the dates of October 1989 and June 1990 at Central Criminal Court in Dublin. The complainant was between 13 and 14 years of age at the time, according to The Irish Times.
After Trial Judge Melanie Greally instructed the jury to acquit O’Rourke of four of the charges, the jury was left to consider one count of rape and 11 charges of indecent assault against O’Rourke.
After just under five and a half hours of deliberation on the fifth day of the trial, the jury returned the guilty verdict. O’Rourke showed no reaction when the verdict was delivered, The Irish Times reported.
Greally remanded O’Rourke for sentencing on July 30.
Addressing the jury, Judge Greally said: “I realize that this has been a difficult case and you have given it 100 percent. This was evident from the questions that you asked. Thank you sincerely, and I hope that this experience has brought something of value to you.”
Earlier in the trial, the victim, now 48, told Prosecutor Patricia McLoughlin SC that O’Rourke started as her sports coach while she was a student in secondary school while she was approximately 13.
She described herself as being “four and a half to five stone in weight (63-70 pounds), I was underdeveloped, my bra was not even 30 AA, I was very skinny, with short hair, and I looked like a child.”
She said that O’Rourke suggested he carry out daily “muscle checks” to help her improve, where he would stand behind her and put “one hand on her right breast and the other on her left breast” and move “his hands up and down”
The “muscle checks” continued to escalate before O’Rourke allegedly raped her.
O’Rourke was jailed for 12 years in January 1998 after he pleaded guilty to 29 offences involving 11 girls on dates between 1976 and 1992. The charges included defilement, sexual assault and indecent assault.
In August 2000, he was sentenced to four years in prison on 19 charges—indecent and sexual assault—involving six girls on unknown dates between July 1970 and December 1992. One of the offences involved oral sex and the girls were between the ages of 10 and 19 and being coached by him, according to The Irish Times.
O’Rourke received a 10-year prison sentence in January 2005 after pleading guilty to two charges of rape and two counts of indecent assault on dates from 1975 to 1978. The sentence was backdated to March 2000.
