Sex abuse victim jailed for uncle's murder

A sex abuse victim who stabbed his uncle to death in a fit of rage was jailed for life at Belfast Crown Court today.

Thomas McQuade, (aged 32), decided to strike because he feared paedophiles were getting away with too lenient sentences.

He later told police: “He ruined my life so I decided to ruin his.”

Trial judge Mr Justice Higgins jailing McQuade for a minimum of 11 years said he had taken into account the abuse he had suffered at the hands of 59-year-old Joseph McQuade but added it was no justification for killing him.

McQuade, from Shackleton Walk in Newtownards Co Down had been found guilty earlier this month after a retrial at Downpatrick Crown Court. The judge had ordered a second trial after the jury in the first had been unable to reach a verdict.

The court had heard that McQuade had stabbed his uncle to death in October 2001 after hearing a radio report about a paedophile receiving a two year sentence for sexually abusing his niece.

McQuade, who two weeks earlier had confronted his uncle about the abuse, asked a neighbour to drive him to his bungalow on the Magherascouse Road near Ballygowan.

He went into the house with his father’s partner and after going to the bathroom, produced a knife and slit his uncle’s throat, shouting “you are a paedophile”. He then stabbed him eight or nine times, twice through the heart.

When McQuade returned to his neighbour’s car, he told him: “I done Joe” and asked him to drive him to a police station. When the neighbour asked why he had stabbed his uncle, he replied: “Joe abused me when I was younger. He ruined my life”.

During the trial a consultant forensic psychiatrist told the court that McQuade who had a long history of violence and crime, was suffering from a severe personality disorder.

The defendant had told the psychiatrist that his uncle had been abusing him since the age of eight. He said he used to visit the family home to drink with his parents and after they went to bed, he would visit his bedroom and rape him.

In 1993 he made a complaint to police and a medical officer who examined him told the court that there was physical evidence that he had been frequently sexually assaulted a long time ago.

His uncle had denied the accusations and the Director of Public Prosecutions decided not to prosecute him because of lack of evidence.

Mr Justice Higgins before passing sentenced said it appeared that by killing his uncle, McQuade believed he was “exorcising his demons”.

The judge said McQuade had thought about killing him for some time. Two weeks before the murder, he confronted him, accusing him of abusing him as a child.

“It seems clear that the deceased mocked the defendant in a most humiliating manner,” he added