Man jailed for Listowel sex assault

A Limerick man has been sentenced to three years by Mr Justice Paul Carney for the sex assault of a woman after the Listowel Races.

The victim awoke to find John Mulvihill (aged 27) sexually assaulting her. When she shouted at him to get off he told her she “seemed to be enjoying” herself.

In a victim impact statement the woman said she relives the assault “over and over” again in her head and that she feels her “life has been turned upside down.”

“I just feel so different to the person I was,” she said, adding that that she suffers from panic attacks and post-traumatic stress disorder. “I just feel so unsafe all the time.”

Mulvihill, of Markievicz Park, Athea, Limerick pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court to sexually assaulting the woman in Listowel on June 30, 2009.

Mr Justice Carney said this case was “typical” of ones that are coming before the courts where a young man of “impeccable character” leaves home for the night without any intentions, but on “taking a cocktail of alcohol comes to oblivious as to whether he has committed a sexual assault”.

He said he had taken into account the inherent gravity of the offence, the effect on the victim and the fact that she was sexually assaulted in a place, where the woman herself said she would have felt safe.

He suspended the final 18 months of the sentence after taking into account his early plea and genuine remorse.

Garda Aoife O’Connell told prosecuting counsel, Conor Devally SC, that the victim was visiting a friend in the town during the races and they went out to several pubs together before going to a nightclub.

The victim’s friend met Mulvihill and the two began “getting friendly”. All three went back to the friend’s apartment and she brought him into her room while the victim went to sleep in another room.

Later that night the victim woke up to find Mulvihill in her bed. He had undressed her and was sexually assaulting her. She shouted at him to get off and he said: “You seemed to be enjoying yourself.”

She started screaming at him and he got dressed and left the apartment. The victim’s friend then received several text messages from Mulvihill apologising for his actions. The next morning the gardaí were alerted and Mulvihill was arrested.

Defence counsel, Anthony Sammon SC, said Mulvihill had a lot to drink that night and deeply regrets his behaviour. Counsel said he “went into a room he ought not to have gone into” and was “throwing himself at the mercy of the court.”

Counsel added that Mulvihill had €5,000 as a “token of compensation” but this was rejected by the victim.