Convicted child rapist jailed after being found in the company of three boys

Declan Brennan

A convicted child rapist found in the company of three teenage boys while serving a suspended prison sentence has been jailed for two and a half years.

In 2008, the late Judge Paul Carney imposed two life sentences, to run concurrently, on Kildare native Philip Sullivan for the rape and sexual assault of two young boys. The boys were aged nine and 11, and the offences took place between 2004 and 2006.

Sullivan, now aged 63, appealed the sentence, and the Court of Appeal quashed the life sentences and instead imposed concurrent sentences of 15 years.

The court suspended the final two and a half years for 10 years on strict conditions, including that Sullivan not be in the company of minors, prosecuting counsel, Oisin Clarke, told the High Court on Monday.

He told Judge Paul McDermott that Sullivan was released from custody in 2017 and was then subject to supervision from the Probation Service and from gardaí under the Sexual Offenders Act 2001.

Detective Garda Niall Freaney told Clarke that on February 15th last, gardaí acting on the foot of confidential information attended at Sullivan's home on Belgrave Terrace, Rathmines. Three boys, aged 15, 16 and 17, were present.

The court heard there was evidence that one of the boys was intoxicated and evidence of the consumption of alcohol and cannabis. There was no evidence that this took place in Sullivan's flat or in his presence, Clarke told the court.

Sullivan told gardaí he was a friend of the father of one of the boys, but when gardaí contacted this man, he said he didn't know Sullivan.

In a meeting with gardaí and his probation officer three days later, Sullivan initially denied that he had again been in contact with one of the boys since the incident in his flat. He later admitted that this boy had met him in the front garden of his home.

Sullivan said the boys were associates of his housemate. Dt Gda Freaney said he had no evidence of this.

Judge McDermott noted evidence that one of the boys told gardaí they had “been going there for a number of weeks”.

Micheal Hourigan, defending, said his client disputes this, and Clarke said the State was not relying on this in their application for the previously suspended portion of the sentence to be reactivated.

Det Gda Freaney accepted a submission from Hourigan that, since his release from prison, Sullivan has not had any other criminal charges and has complied with all other conditions of his bail.

The detective told the court that since he became Sullivan's monitoring officer in 2020, he would have met him regularly - initially twice a month and later less frequently. He told Hourigan that no minors were ever present on any other occasions.

The court heard that gardaí could attend at Sullivan's home either on an unannounced basis or by arrangement.

Sullivan's case officer, Sean Louth, told the court that Sullivan had previously been assessed as being at a medium risk of re-offending but this has increased to high risk, given the events in February.

Louth told the court that he regularly met Sullivan and repeatedly reminded him of the requirement to have no contact with children or vulnerable adults. He said the last meeting took place on January 29th.

He said this requirement was “a fundamental tenet of the supervision of Mr Sullivan” and that his ability to monitor Sullivan “safely within the community” had been “absolutely significantly negatively impacted”.

Judge McDermott said that the 10 years of suspension were required “to ensure that the nature of what happened in past did not happen again” as well as to allow for rehabilitation.

He said that minor breaches of conditions don't normally trigger applications to the court and that the Probation Service has significant discretion.

“What can’t be tolerated, given the nature of the offences, is association with children. That was made clear,” he said. He noted that when confronted, Sullivan was not candid or forthcoming.

He granted the application to revoke the suspension of the two-and-a-half-year custodial sentence.

At the Central Criminal Court in 2008, Judge Paul Carney said Sullivan had destroyed incredibly young lives, had breached a position of trust and had not responded to treatment programmes or counselling.

Sullivan, who is from Kildare town, had an address at the time at Botanic Road, in Glasnevin, Dublin.

If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article, you can call the national 24-hour Rape Crisis Helpline at 1800-77 8888, access text service and webchat options at drcc.ie/services/helpline/ or visit Rape Crisis Help. In the case of an emergency, always dial 999/112.