Farmer jailed for raping friend's daughter

A Cavan farmer who raped and sexually assaulted the 13-year-old daughter of a long-time friend for nine months has been jailed for five years by Mr Justice Paul Carney at the Central Criminal Court heard.

Victor Thompson, an agricultural contractor, worked on the victim's family farm and all the incidents, except for one on his own farm, occurred there.

The court was told that Thompson's family and the victim's father's family went back three generations and the two men had grown up together.

Thompson (aged 57), a married father-of-three, of Canningstown, Cootehill, pleaded guilty to nine counts of sexual assault and rape on the girl between June 2000 and February 2001.

Mr Justice Carney said he had initially contemplated a much greater sentence but he took into account the substantial genuine remorse that Thompson showed.

"These were very serious offences and showed great breaches of trust on the part of the accused, particularly having regard to the relationship between the two families," he said.

"For nine months he perpetrated these outrages upon this child and then in his statements he tried to shift the blame on to her, and she is in no way to blame whatsoever. But he has shown genuine remorse and pleaded guilty at the earliest possible stage."

Mr Shane Murphy SC, prosecuting, said the victim's father had no problem with Thompson's identity being publicised in the media because the whole community was aware of the case.

Sergeant John O'Reilly told Mr Murphy the incidents started when the girl, the youngest of four children, was on Thompson's loader on the farm and asked if she could drive. He said she could if she gave him a kiss.

After that sexual assaults occurred quite frequently and initially involved Thompson taking off the girl's clothes and fondling her genitalia. He also made her masturbate him.

The offences then moved on to oral sex between them and the girl later admitted that she had never heard of a 'blowjob' before Thompson started sexually assaulting her.

Thompson once brought her out to his own 65-acre farm and sexually assaulted her in a shed. Sgt O'Reilly said there was no violence in any of the incidents but it appeared that Thompson had manipulated the girl's emotions.

The offences came to light when the victim admitted to friends, who were slightly older than her, at her Cavan boarding school what had been going on between herself and Thompson. They contacted the school's headmaster and the North Eastern Health Board were subsequently informed.

When the gardai brought Thompson in for questioning he didn't know what it was about but when he was told he reacted very remorseful and ashamed and admitted the offences.

The girl's father told Mr Murphy that he now found dealing with his young daughter very traumatic at times.

"A lot of anger appears at times in her dealings with us. We find it extremely stressful because of the anger that sometimes bubbles up to the surface," he said.

"She confides a lot in her older sister and that puts an awful strain on her at times. My intimate relationship with my wife has also suffered as a result of what happened. We're finding it all very difficult to cope with."

Mr Patrick MacEntee SC, for Thompson, said his client had led a blameless life up until now. He was completely ashamed of himself and profoundly regretted what he did. He was now a broken man and his wife had become suicidal because she was so ashamed.

Mr MacEntee said Thompson realised that he would now be put on the Sex Offenders Register and wanted to apologise, not only to the girl, but to her family and the community.

Mr Justice Carney suspended the last 18 months of the sentence because Thompson's early guilty plea meant that the slot in the court list had become available for someone else.