Man gets 9 years for raping girl after party

A WICKLOW native who raped a 13-year-old girl at a First Communion celebration after plying her with alcohol has been jailed for nine years.

Noel Savage, aged 45, told gardaí on his arrest: “I thought she was 14 and I am not a paedophile, although I did have sexual urges towards her.”

Savage, originally from Bray but with address at Corrib Park, Newcastle in Galway, pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court last July to one count of sexual assault on the girl at a house in Galway on May 16, 2010. He was found guilty of one count of rape and a further count of sexual assault on the same girl by a jury later that month.