Court dismisses alleged rape victim's garda negligence claim

The High Court has dismissed a woman's claim that Garda negligence resulted in her being raped in her own home by a 56-year-old man who had just killed his wife.

However in his ruling today Mr Justice John Hedigan awarded the woman €200,000 in damages against Joseph Kinsella. The woman, the judge found, had quite clearly suffered "a violent and most distressing attack" by Kinsella.

In her action the woman claimed she was asked by a garda on May 27, 1999 if Kinsella, the husband of her friend Bente Carroll, could stay at her house.

The woman said she was informed Ms Carroll (aged 45) had been found dead some hours earlier and Kinsella could not stay at his own home.

The woman, who lived alone in her Dublin home at the time, claims she did not like Mr Kinsella but allowed him stay because the gardaí asked her to. Some 24 hours later while he was in her home, she claimed Kinsella raped her at knifepoint.

In her action against Kinsella, the Minister for Justice, Ireland and the Attorney General, the woman claimed the gardai were negligent in delivering Kinsella to her home. He had previous convictions for rape, arson and assault and who was later convicted of the unlawful killing of his wife.

The State defendants denied negligence.

Kinsella was convicted in 2001 of the manslaughter of his Danish wife but a jury unanimously cleared him of her murder.

Kinsella, with an address Corduff Grove, Blanchardstown, denied murdering Ms Carroll but he admitted strangling her at their home on May 26, 1999 following a two-day drinking spree. He was sentenced to 12 years and has since been released.

The woman previously obtained a judgment against Kinsella while he was detained at Arbour Hill prison. No charge was ever brought against Kinsella in relation to the alleged rape of the woman.

In his judgment Mr Justice Hedigan said that on the basis of now well established law no duty of care by the gardaí arose from the circumstances of the case.

The Judge found that the garda decision to bring Kinsella to the woman's house after Mrs Carroll's body was discovered was not something done in the course of their investigatory functions.