Raft of civil actions in pipeline once paedophile teacher is sentenced

John McClean admitted 27 charges of indecent assault. Photo: Collins Courts

Shane Phelan Twitter Email

February 12 2021 02:30 AM

Several civil actions relating to child abuser John McClean are set to come before the courts after he is finally sentenced for his crimes.

Nine lawsuits have already been filed against the former teacher and rugby coach.

Several include the board of management of Terenure College and the Carmelite religious order, which runs the private school, as co-defendants. Both the order and the board of management have apologised to victims and abuse survivors.

With the criminal process reaching its conclusion, solicitors now expect more victims to come forward with claims.

McClean (76), of Casimir Avenue, Harold’s Cross, Dublin, will be sentenced next Thursday after Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard evidence over two days this week from victims.

Last November, he pleaded guilty to 27 charges of indecently assaulting males at Terenure College between 1973 and 1990. The charges relate to 23 individual complainants.

School: John McClean was a teacher at Terenure College

Since then four civil actions have been filed, adding to five others already lodged with the High Court.

Dave Coleman of Coleman Legal Partners, which is representing some of McClean’s victims, said he expected the number of cases to grow.

“More people are coming forward to seek recompense for what happened to them,” he said.

For three decades McClean was an English and drama teacher, who also coached rugby, but he left the school in 1996 after allegations were made against him and took up a role coaching rugby at UCD.

Several of the legal actions are expected to focus on alleged failings by the school and the order.

One victim told the court “everyone in the school knew” what McClean was doing.

Another asked how the school could have allowed it to happen and how many teachers knew and “turned a blind eye”.

The court heard how in the late 1970s McClean abused a 14-year-old boy during a costume fitting for a school play.

Older boys brought this to the attention of the then principal. McClean was removed from any involvement in costume fitting in 1979, but the following year was made dean of the first-year students and given his own office.

One victim said Terenure was and still is full of wonderful teachers, but when he was at school “some chose to look the other way”.

In a statement last November, the board of management and the order said they were “sincerely sorry for the breach of trust and for the pain and suffering those affected by the abuse endured”.

It continued: “As school management and Carmelites, we acknowledge and deeply regret that we failed these children entrusted to our care.”