Convicted sex abuser begins appeal against conviction

A former Marist brother and primary school teacher has begun an appeal against his conviction for sexually abusing four young boys at a Sligo school over 40 years ago.

Christopher Cosgrove (aged 67) was sentenced to 12 months imprisonment by Judge Patrick McCartan in May last year after a Dublin Circuit Criminal Court jury found him guilty on 35 counts of indecent assault.

Cosgrove, of Ballyhaunis Road, Claremorris, Co Mayo, had pleaded not guilty to the offences which occurred at the school on dates between July 1, 1968 and June 30, 1977.

The court heard that Cosgrove would call the complainants up to a desk at the top of his classroom and fondle their private parts.

Counsel for the applicant, Mr Hugh Hartnett SC, said this was an “extraordinary” case which appeared to involve the phenomenon of recovered memory with regard to one complainant, who told the court he had no recollection of the abuse for 25 years after it had taken place.

Mr Hartnett said that the complainant had agreed in cross-examination that only when he was approached by gardai a third time and invited to discuss “life in school” did the memory of the abuse return.

He said the trial judge erred in principle by failing to withdraw the counts relating to this complainant from the jury and by failing to warn them on the dangers of convicting the accused man on the phenomenon of recovered memory.

Mr Hartnett said that Judge McCartan could not have properly directed the jury on this concept as there remains considerable professional and scientific debate on the feasibility of recovering memories and contention as to whether such a process could create false memories.

He asked whether it was possible for the jury to return a conviction having regard to the absence of any explanation for the suppression of the memories, the age of the offences, and the fact that the case was built around evidence of a system of abuse perpetrated by the accused man.

Summarising a total of 19 grounds of appeal, Mr Hartnett also said that Judge McCarten failed to properly direct the jury on the issue of prejudice against the accused man arising out of the delay in bringing prosecution and submitted that he should have withdrawn all counts from the jury on this basis.

He said that Judge McCarten erred by remarking that there was no onus on the applicant to give evidence on his own behalf and by telling jurors that they could regard the evidence of one complainant as corroborative of the evidence of another.

Ms Mary Rose Gearty SC, for the State, said that at the outset of the prosecution case the jury were given a very long description of the dangers relating to the delay in bringing a case against the applicant.

She said the case was one of the strongest she had encountered as a prosecutor as multiple complainants had given evidence describing the same abuse by the same man.

Ms Gearty said that Judge McCartan had not purported to make a decision on the concept of recovered memory, did not give it his “stamp of approval” and warned the jury to be careful in this regard.

Presiding judge Mr Justice Donal O’Donnell said that matters would be adjourned until January 12 next, when counsel on both sides will further address the court on the grounds of appeal raised.