Mother jailed for catalogue of child abuse

A MOTHER will spend the next eight years in prison after a catalogue of shocking violence against eight of her children, which included regularly attaching vice grips to her children’s faces as punishment.

After hearing details of the litany of violence inflicted by the 47-year-old woman over a seven-year period, Judge Raymond Groarke expressed concern that such abuse could go on for so long with little or no intervention.

In harrowing testimony, Galway Circuit Court was told how the woman:

nStood by as her 14-year-old daughter was stabbed through the arm and then helped stitch the wound at home with an ordinary needle and thread without anaesthetic so the girl could not make a complaint to authorities.

nStood by when the same girl was tied to a tree and whipped until she was nearly dead.

nTied one of her daughters to a horse and then whipped both the child and the horse so it would bolt.

nAttached vice grips to her children’s noses, ears and lips to punish them.

nHit her daughter over the head with a hammer and then dipped her in a river to clean the wound.

The court was also told the woman even beat one of her sons with whips and sticks in a bid to make him look disabled so that she could claim extra social welfare benefits.

The court was told that as well as the violence, there were repeated and persistent episodes of neglect.

One daughter told gardaí how their mother would lock them all in a confined space with no food and give them a wet sheet to sleep on for the night. One of the children recalled how their mother often went away for a week at a time and they would have to beg food from neighbours.

The second-youngest daughter, who was born with physical disabilities, was found strapped into a filthy buggy by a social worker in 2002. The room in which she was discovered by authorities was filthy and cold and there were nappies strewn everywhere. A social worker advised the mother to bring the child, who had breathing difficulties, for treatment to a local hospital but she never did so.

Gardaí said the woman had complete control over the family’s finances and channelled all money received for the children into post office and credit union accounts for herself, while depriving her children of food and clothing.

In victim impact statements read to the court, one daughter said of her mother: “She was not a mother to me. She was an evil bitch.”

The woman’s defence counsel confirmed his client had no psychiatric or psychological problems but said she had a serious alcohol addiction for many years.