Sentence increased to 14 years for repeat child rape

A man whose neighbour allowed him to rape her daughter repeatedly over a three-year period from the age of five has been sentenced to 14 years in prison following a finding last year by the Court of Appeal that his original eight-year-sentence was too lenient.

President of the Court of Appeal Mr Justice Seán Ryan had said the man’s crimes stood “on the most heinous level” of offending which involved “depravity amounting to torture”.

The Roscommon man who cannot be identified, had pleaded guilty to repeated categories of rape as well as the sexual assault of a neighbour’s young daughter on dates between 2004 and 2008. Mr Justice Ryan said the victim was aged five when the first offence took place.

He had been sentenced by Mr Justice Paul Carney to eight years’ imprisonment on each of 15 counts of rape, and five years on five counts of sexual assault.

The sentences, which were all to run concurrently, were found to be unduly lenient by the Court of Appeal last December, following a successful application by the DPP.

Mr Justice Ryan said yesterday that the case had to be among “the worst that the courts have considered”.

He said the sentencing judge had fallen into “grave error” by holding that a sentence of eight years for the rape charges was appropriate.