‘It felt like she was supporting a rapist’

A VICTIM of Cork rapist Trevor Casey has told how her psychological torment was compounded by the spectre of political involvement in his sentencing.

The 21-year-old woman has said she and her younger sister had suffered both physically and emotionally since Casey, aged 31, began raping them.

She even started cutting herself to try to cope with the trauma but has struggled to get on with her life.

“When it started I went completely inside myself. I wouldn’t go out, wouldn’t talk to anyone. I had to be myself at all times. It just wrecked my life.

“I started self-harming to deal with it, put the pain on the outside instead, so I could cope,” she said.

She said her expectation that she would be supported by the wider community was dashed at Casey’s sentencing hearing when it emerged a letter written by Labour deputy Kathleen Lynch was submitted to the judge.

Although the letter explained Ms Lynch did not know 31-year-old Casey from Fairhill, it said he had come from a family that was highly regarded in the community.

The victim said the emergence of this letter was hard to take.

“It was a disgrace, I was hurt by it, it felt like she was supporting a convicted rapist. When she should have been supporting me.

“We were all very angry, she is a politician for everyone and yet she supported him.

“She left everyone down, I think she should be ashamed of herself if that is she is standing for... if that is who she want’s out on the street,” she told Cork’s Red FM.

In an interview with TV3 she said her focus was on trying to move on now that Casey has been sentenced to 14 years in jail.

She also said she hoped to help other victims by ensuring her case was used to improve the system.

“There is no point keeping it to yourself because it just eats at you, you think you can get over it but you can’t unless you talk,” she told TV3 news.

However, the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre has said political representatives need to go further and introduce legislation to protect victims from adversity in the court process.

Its chief executive Ellen O’Malley Dunlop said all parties should put differences aside and support Fine Gael’s victims’ right’s bill, which its justice spokesman Charlie Flanagan has proposed.

Referring to Casey, she said: “This man committed a most heinous crime against vulnerable 14 and 16 year old girls. He was convicted and whatever type of family Trevor Casey or any other convicted person comes from, should in no way affect the punishment he deserves.

“The Fine Gael bill goes a long way in redressing the imbalance that has developed in our systems and gives victims the rights they deserve and are entitled to.”