"I have won, I have survived and now my life starts": Rape victim reacts to jailing of former council worker

"Today I take my life back I am so glad to get this day to be able to stand here in front of my family and friends and say what I’ve wanted to say for years to you Batty Prendergast. I have won, I have survived and now my life starts and yours ends lonely and miserable which is just what you deserve. You can never hurt anyone again. From this I take great peace."

That is an extract from a long victim impact statement by one of Bartholomew Prendergast's victims, Stephanie Hickey, which was read to the court last July.

Stephanie Hickey (46) along with her sister, Deirdre Fahy (52), waived their right to anonymity at a sentence hearing last July so their abuser and brother-in-law Bartholomew Prendergast (66) could be named.

Today the former Waterford county council worker was sentenced to 10 years for the sexual abuse and rape of the two sisters and a third woman over the course of 12 years.

Sisters, Deirdre Fahy (left) and Stephanie Hickey speak to the media as they leave the Central Criminal Court today after the sentencing of Bartholomew Prendergast. Prendergast pleaded guilty to the sexual abuse of both women and was sentenced to ten years in jail. Photo: Laura Hutton/Collins.

During her statement last July Stephanie Hickey often spoke directly to her abuser.

"The pain I have carried silently growing up you will never know," she said.

"You took from me everything a child should have as they grow up, while I was supposed to be protected by adults whose care I was in during this time. I lost my virginity because of you and I wasn’t even old enough to understand what you were taking from me. For this I will never ever forgive you.

"The fear you put in me of never wanting it to get dark at night time, the fear of going to bed never wanting to go to sleep in case you came to the room as you always did and cause me more pain and fear that I couldn’t stop it.

“I also hated having to take journeys alone with you in your lorry or van as I knew this always meant I would have to perform all these despicable acts that I hated and feared. I had to watch you full of pleasure and make me feel that this was normal this was good."

She said that when the rapes and sexual abuses took place she would feel like she was going to die.

"I would feel as if I was choking and could not breathe. The fear was and will forever be inside me. This is all down to you."

Ms Hickey said her life had been built around shame, regret, no confidence and hating herself - her body and everything about myself.

"I have missed out on so much happiness as a child through to teenage years. You have robbed me of it all, my body can never heal or recover. You took it all for your pleasure but I will forever be paying the price for an evil sick man."

She said she was led to believe by a family friend, a priest, that in the 1980s he was "fixed".

"I was told that there was proof of this, or so my sister your wife told me just under three years ago," she said. "If you were supposedly fixed why did you continue to abuse me for years after? For this I feel very hurt, and let down by whoever fixed you. I need answers from whom you spoke to help you at this time and, again, why as a child I wasn’t protected as this hurt goes on."

The mother of four described how her marriage ended due to her lack of confidence and because her self-worth didn’t allow her to stand up for herself and believe she deserved respect and love as her past life was haunting her.

"I will try to stop blaming myself for what you, you monster inflicted on me. I am no longer your victim I have taken back my life. I will never get my past back but now I have a future. You now will be the lonely one, with no friends, no voice, no independence. It was my voice, my sister and (reference to the third woman). You controlled and manipulated us for many years but we are survivors.

"I want you to fear sleep and fear being alone. I want you to forever more feel pain albeit with this you will just feel a little bit of my pain.

"When I started this process the stress and anxiety was made so much worse than I could ever have imagined. But from today I will allow myself to believe in me and stop blaming myself for what I know was not my fault.

Ms Fahy said she went from being a happy innocent child to living in constant fear. She said she felt huge regret that she didn't speak out when it happened to her, especially after she heard that “he was doing the same and worse to my sister”.

“To think I could have stopped her from the hurt,” Ms Fahy said before she added that she feels that she can now “finally move on”.

“The last two and half years have been horrendous. I will never shake of the guilt that if I had spoken out at the time...,” Ms Fahy said before she thanked the gardaí and her family for their support.

The third woman's statement was read into the record. She said she was abused as a child when she was vulnerable and unable to defend herself.

She said the whole legal process took a lot of energy from her, opening old wounds and while Prendergast was innocent until proven guilty, “I was guilty until proven innocent”.

The woman said it took a long time to realise she was not to blame and described how during the abuse she was “paralysed with fear”.

“I couldn't move or speak, my heart was thumping in my chest and ears. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack,” she continued.

She said she was worried that Prendergast might abuse his own daughter and wondered how his wife stayed with him.

“The fact that her husband was a paedophile would be one hard drug to swallow,” she said.

She said his actions have hurt many people and said their lives have been consumed with it. She described the damage as “irreversible” and wondered why it was not stopped years ago when it was brought to people's attention.

“I wondered why I didn't kick him in the testicles,” the woman said before she added that she doesn't blame herself anymore.

“The wheel has turned full circle,” she said before she concluded that she hopes Prendergast doesn't “put the fear of God into a child again".

Former Waterford council worker jailed for 10 years for rape and abuse of three women over 12 years

Earlier: A former Waterford county council worker has been sentenced to 10 years for the sexual abuse and rape of two sisters and a third woman over the course of 12 years.

Stephanie Hickey (46) along with her sister, Deirdre Fahy (52), waived their right to anonymity at a sentence hearing last July so their abuser and brother-in-law Bartholomew Prendergast (66) can be named.

Reading from her victim impact statement Ms Hickey asked how the abuse could have continued when Prendergast was “supposedly fixed” after a priest directed him to get counselling.

At the Central Criminal Court last July Garda Patricia Lonergan told Michael Delaney SC, prosecuting, that after “something was brought to the attention of Stephanie's parents”, a local priest was consulted and Prendergast was sent for counselling, but continued to abuse Ms Hickey afterwards.

Bartholomew Prendergast pictured at an earlier court sitting

All three women made statements to gardaí in December 2015.

Gda Lonergan said “various disclosures” had been made to different members of the families involved over the years, but nothing was ever done apart from the meeting with the priest.

Prendergast, of Cruachan, Dungarvan was arrested in April 2016 and interviewed three times. He denied ever raping Stephanie Hickey and said he was both “vehement and definite in those denials”.

He pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court to the offences following a day of legal argument after a jury had been sworn in for his trial.

He has recently retired from Waterford County Council and is also a well known musician in the locality. He has since separated from his wife, has three adult children and has no previous convictions.

He pleaded guilty to two counts of rape and 13 counts of indecent assault of his sister-in-law Stephanie Hickey at locations in Co Waterford and Co Tipperary on dates between 1983 and 1987.

Ms Hickey was aged between 12 and 15 years old at the time of the offences.

Prendergast also pleaded guilty to one count of indecent assault against Ms Fahy on a date between 1979 and 1981, while she was aged between 13 and 14 years old.

He further pleaded guilty to two counts of indecent assault of a third woman, now 39 years old, on dates between 1988 and 1991, while she was aged between nine and 12 years old. This woman is aware that Prendergast will be named in reporting of the case but she does not wish to be identified.

Today Ms Justice Eileen Creedon suspended the final 18 months of a ten year prison sentence on strict conditions, including that Prendergast undergo a sex offenders treatment programme and be under the supervision of The Probation Service for 18 months.

She said it was clear that there was “a profound and negative impact on the victims” who were all left feeling “fear, guilt and shame”.

She said Prendergast's crime also impacted the women's family lives and their own relationships.

“He was part of the inner family circle,” Ms Justice Creedon said before she added that the women were entitled to feel safe in Prendergast's company and equally their parents should have been able to feel that their daughters would be safe with him.

The judge said the offences were “a serious breach of trust” and the women found “difficult to escape” from the abuse.

She also noted the evidence that the abuse continued despite a family discussion of it and an “intervention” from a local priest.

Ms Justice Creedon gave Prendergast credit for his ultimate pleas of guilty, noting that it was “an important step in vindicating the victims”.

She acknowledged a submission from his legal team that “given his profile in the community” the publication of his name will represent “an additional burden” for both Prendergast and his family.

Gda Lonergan said at the previous hearing that Prendergast married Patricia Hickey, Stephanie's and Deirdre's sister in June 1981 and the couple moved into a three storey building in west Waterford.

Patricia set up a hairdressing salon on the ground floor and Stephanie visited most weekends to help out.

Ms Hickey later told gardaí that Prendergast first started to abuse her when she was 12 years old, either in his family home or while he was driving her to and from her own family home, which was also in west Waterford.

Gda Lonergan confirmed that Stephanie was mainly made perform oral sex on Prendergast and masturbate him but said that he also raped the teenager on two occasions.

She said on the day of the rape she had asked him to stop because it hurt but he said it would get better. She recalled being about 15 years old at the time.

She said he raped her on at least one other occasion but she was not sure what age she was.

Deirdre Fahy told gardaí that she was 13 or 14 years old when she accepted a lift to the local shop from Prendergast. He was not married to her sister at the time. On the way home, he pulled over the car, put his hand inside her blouse, fondled her breast and kissed her.

She said she froze, he backed off and asked her if she had liked it. She said that was the only occasion Prendergast had touched her sexually.

The third woman was first abused by Prendergast in June 1988 when she was nine years old.

This woman said on one occasion Prendergast masturbated in front of her while sitting with her in his truck. When they returned home, her mother came out to greet them and Prendergast continued to masturbate while her mother stood below the cab driver's door talking up to him.

She described on another occasion that he sexually assaulted her in the kitchen of “a house full of people” after telling her she looked lovely.