Posted by TODAY the Irish Sunday People exposes Ireland’s 12 most evil men.
In a week which saw one abuser jailed for just three years for a decade-long reign of terror against his daughter, we lift the lid on the Dirty Dozen.
Incredibly, some are free.
Others will be coming to live in a town or village near you over the next few months and years.
All have one thing in common.
They have abused and robbed Irish children of their innocence.
But despite being found guilty of horrendous sexual crimes many have escaped with almost laughable sentences.
Some have never served as much as a day behind bars.
Many of the dirty dozen are living among us, trying desperately to hide their evil past.
They do not wear raincoats and live in the shadows of darkness.
Many are pretending to be model citizens, in a bid to don the cloak of respectability once more.
One is a priest, another a businessman and one is even a health care worker employed to give cash handouts to the poor.
There was justified outrage this week when so-called human rights campaigner Vincent McKenna was sentenced to just three years imprisonment for abusing his daughter.
His terrified daughter Sorcha wept tears of anger at the leniency of the sentence.
“He started abusing me when I was four. It’s ridiculous that he only got three years,” she sobbed.
Sorcha said she hoped the pathetic sentence would not deter other victims from coming forward.
“I just hope other people won’t be put off and will have the courage to look for justice,” she said.
But McKenna is not alone.
Across Ireland sexual abusers are being given light sentences for some of the most horrific sexual abuse crimes ever committed.
Fiona Neary, chairperson of the Rape Crisis Centres of Ireland said the number of sex abusers in the country was at crisis point.
The message being given out by the courts handing down such light sentences was that it was okay to abuse children, she said.
“The people who are carrying out these crimes are clever people. They read the newspapers and look at the television and see these sentences being passed.
“They know what they can get away with and are taking the risk.
“The Government and the courts are sending out all the wrong signals with these lenient sentences,” she slammed.
And Ms Neary revealed that the public only knew about the tip of the sex abuse iceberg.
“It is a fact that only 20 per cent of all sex abuse crimes are reported to Gardai. Nobody knows the extent of abuse that is going on in Ireland.
“Ireland needs to wake up to the fact that we have an epidemic of sex abuse going on.”
“And by handing down light sentences as in the Vincent McKenna case, we are only helping that epidemic to breathe,” she said.
Today we call on the Judicial system and the Director of Public Prosecutions to increase the severity of these sentences.
These men can leave their jail cells behind them.
Their victims will have to serve a life sentence.
FR. IVAN PAYNE: Known as Ivan The Terrible, the Dublin priest was sentenced to seven years in 1998 for a litany of sexual abuse.
While abusing his innocent victims the twisted priest would refer to them as his ‘little angels’.
He is understood to have abused young children in parishes across the Dublin diocese.
Payne is currently serving his sentence in the Curragh prison camp which is nicknamed the Vatican because of the number of clerics serving time there.
Aged 59, Payne is due for release in a couple of years time.
DANNY HARKIN: Harkin was convicted of hoarding the biggest ever porn library in the history of the state.
Many of his 1,150 disgusting videos included images of children being sexually abused.
When Gardai raided his cottage home, they returned two weeks later to discover that Harkin had started his disgusting operation once more.
The former health board worker pleaded guilty recently to having the vile material at his home in Letterkenny, Co Donegal.
Despite his admission, Harkin escaped jail and was only fined pounds 1,500. No order for medical treatment was made.
He will not be included on any sex offenders register.
FRANK HAMILTON: Once the respectable editor of the now defunct Limerick Weekly Echo newspaper, Hamilton was considered a model citizen.
But following a Garda operation 51-year-old Hamilton was caught with a 14-year-old girl in a Dublin hotel bedroom.
The girl had been lured to the hotel before being plied with drink.
In 1998 Hamilton was sentenced to seven years imprisonment for sexual assault – which was reduced to three years on appeal.
When Gardai raided his home they found 69 porn videos, some of which contained disgusting sexual images involving both children and animals.
He was released from the Curragh prison camp early last month and Gardai are unaware of his whereabouts.
His name will not be on a sex offenders register.
VINCENT MCKENNA: McKenna, a so-called human rights activist, abused his daughter Sorcha for eight long years between 1985 and 1993, while campaigning for others.
This week the 37-year-old pervert, who ruined the life of his beautiful daughter, was given a pathetic three years behind bars at Cavan Circuit Court.
His victim burst into tears and collapsed into the arms of a friend as the lenient sentence was read out.
And it is unlikely that evil McKenna, who campaigned for an end to punishment beatings in Northern Ireland, will even serve that.
Judge Matt Deery described a total of 31 indecent and sexual assault charges against McKenna as being ‘continuous abuse, nearly routine’.
McKenna is likely to be back walking the streets in 2003.
WILLIAM CURRAN: Twisted William Curran video-taped children playing in school playgrounds from the blacked-out windows of his van.
The 49-year-old pedophile was recently sent down for just 18 months for child pornography.
Gardai had been warned about the activities of the dangerous Dubliner who was suspected of being involved in making child porn videos.
Residents in the Finglas area fear their children may appear in the vile videos, many of which are already in the hands of perverts.
With good behaviour, Curran, who even fostered children, will be back on the streets and able to film again, in just over 12 months time.
ROBERT HOWARD: Nicknamed the Wolfman, this 56-year-old Englishman has a horrific record for abuse and rape in both Northern Ireland and Britain.
He has attacked five children in Britain and has convictions stretching back to 1971.
Despite being on the British Sex Offenders Register, Gardai here are almost helpess to touch him.
Gardai believe he is living freely in Ireland and want to interview him about a number of attempted abductions of children here.
PAUL MOORE: The 36-year-old Dubliner’s sickening attack on a woman in 1994 earned him a five year jail sentence.
At the time the rape of the woman in the Drimnagh area of Dublin sickened the nation.
Now the vicious Dubliner is free again, and does not have to report his whereabouts to Gardai, who fear he may strike again.
NORMAN PORTER-JONES: First exposed by Irish Sunday People in 1998, Porter-Jones was living just one hundred yards from a Co Donegal school.
At the time he was facing sex abuse charges in Northern Ireland but Gardai claimed they could do nothing about it.
While awaiting trial Porter-Jones even dressed up as Santa for children at a party arranged by the company he worked for.
Since then the former British Navy diver has been extradited to Scotland to serve three years for sex offences there.
However he is free to return to Ireland when he serves his sentence and will not be included on any sex offenders register.
FR.EUGENE GREENE: Greene is seen as one of the most horrific child abusers in the history of the state. A respected church figure, he had been abusing altar boys for over three decades.
Earlier this year the 71-year-old monster was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment after pleading guilty to a massive 40 sample sex abuse charges.
His victims wept openly in court as they retold their horror at the hands of the popular priest.
SEAN HOGAN: Nicknamed ‘Fivers’ because he paid young boys pounds 5 for sexual favours, Corkman Hogan is considered one of Ireland’s most evil paedophiles.
A cerebral palsy sufferer, he was known to Gardai for years before being locked up in May 1999.
A brazen abuser, his home on Cork’s northside was attacked so often by vigilantes that he had to finally move out.
He finally went on trial after another young sex abuser told Gardai how he suffered at the hands of Hogan.
Now in his early 40s Hogan gets around with the aid of crutches. He still protests his innocence from jail and is due for release in 2002.
JOSEPH MCCOLGAN: McColgan’s horrific abuse of his four children repulsed Ireland.
He played the perfect father and was seen as a role model in Co Sligo.
However behind closed doors McColgan was committing some of the most horrendous crimes against his family.
In 1997 he was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment for a litany of sexual crimes against his children.
He is due for parole in a couple of years time.
DAVID MURRAY sexually abused orphans and his own foster sons and is serving a ten-year sentence.
The Kilkenny childcare worker is another pervert who will be out of the nick soon.
Murray, 53, was described at his trial as an “obsessive, fixated paedophile”.
He faced an incredible 271 charges of indecent assault and gross indecency.
He only pleaded guilty AFTER victims were forced to re-live their ordeals by giving evidence in court.
ABUSE VICTIM: Sorcha McKenna was abused by her father, Vincent; FR IVAN PAYNE: Litany of sexual abuse DANNY HARKIN: Hoarded porn library FRANK HAMILTON: Caught with girl VINCENT McKENNA: Abused his daughter; WILLIAM CURRAN: Video-taped children ROBERT HOWARD: Horrific record of rape PAUL MOORE: Sickening attack on woman NORMAN PORTER-JONES: Sex offender; FR EUGENE GREEN: Abused altar boys SEAN HOGAN: Paid young boys for sex JOSEPH McCOLGAN: Litany of sex crimes DAVID MURRAY: Obsessive paedophile
Who Watches the Watchers? 