Eugene Greene among four clerics convicted of sex crimes in Raphoe
ABUSERS
EUGENE Greene, one of the country's most notorious clerical child sex abusers, is among four clerics convicted of abuse in Raphoe.
Greene pleaded guilty to 41 sample charges of buggery, gross indecency and indecent assault against 26 schoolboys between 1965 and 1982, and was jailed for 12 years at Donegal Circuit Court in 2000.
In the Diocese of Raphoe, accusations were levelled against 14 priests, with four clerics convicted of abuse.
The others were former priest Paul McDaid, Fr Daniel Doherty and his brother Fr John Doherty.
McDaid was sentenced to two years in prison in October 2003 after pleading guilty to possession of child pornography.
He left religious life in 1996 after meeting a woman who later became his fiancee. Police raided his home in 2002.
Among the references submitted to the court on his behalf was one from the former Bishop of Raphoe, Dr Seamus Hegarty. McDaid worked for him as secretary while he was a priest in the early 1990s.
Daniel Doherty was given a seven-year prison sentence in 2006 after he was found guilty in the Central Criminal Court of twice raping a 13-year-old girl on dates in 1985, and of indecently assaulting her that same year and in his car on a date in December 1984. Meanwhile the report into the Diocese of Tuam showed that 18 priests faced allegations, with two clerics sentenced.
One was Martin Greaney, who received a seven-year sentence at Ballina Circuit Court in November 1997 on sample charges of abusing eight girls.
The abuse took place in counties Galway, Mayo and Tipperary, with Judge Harvey Kenny stating that the lives of 30 children had been ruined by Greaney's activities. The second, Joseph Summerville, was a chaplain at a boys college in the west and in May 1996 he received a four-year sentence for indecently assaulting a boy at the college and at a parochial house.
In the Diocese of Ardagh and Clonmacnoise, 13 priests faced allegations, while one was convicted.
Twelve of the priests had died by the time the allegations were made.
- Colm Kelpie
Irish Independent
