Man who raped nephew and threatened to stab parents is jailed as victim urges others to ‘step into light’

The abuse took place at the man’s home address on dates between January 1, 1996 and December 31, 1999 when the boy was aged between eight and 10 years old

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A man who repeatedly and forcibly raped his nephew when the boy was a child and threatened to stab his parents if he told anyone has been jailed for 11 years.

The 58-year-old Cork man, who can’t be named to protect his victim’s identity, was found guilty by a jury of three counts of oral rape and three counts of anally raping his nephew following a Central Criminal Court trial in Cork last month.

The abuse took place at the man’s home address on dates between January 1, 1996 and December 31, 1999 when the boy was aged between eight and 10 years old and the man was in his thirties.

A local detective garda told Thomas Creed SC, prosecuting, that the abuse happened on three separate occasions when the man either called to the boy to come up to his room or accosted him outside and brought him up to his bedroom. The man told his nephew that he would stab his parents if he told anyone about the abuse. The boy was in pain and bleeding after each incident, the court heard. The man has no previous convictions.

In a victim impact statement which he read out to court himself, the complainant said that when he was a young boy, crimes were carried out on him “that no human being should have to suffer”. “Something inside me died,” he said. He told the court the abuse changed him and he started getting into trouble and fighting authority figures as a result of the trauma he suffered “and continue to suffer every single day of my life