danger to society | 

Notorious sex offender back on the street despite one year prison sentence

Anthony Goodman (79) of no fixed abode, has 218 convictions for offences including multiple sexual assaults and buggering of an animal

Alan Sherry

Today at 06:43

GARDAI are on high alert after a notorious repeat sex offender with more than 200 convictions walked free from prison this week despite being sentenced to one year behind bars for multiple breaches of a sex offender order.

Anthony Goodman (79) of no fixed abode, has 218 convictions for offences including multiple sexual assaults, buggering of an animal, indecency, breaches of a sex offender order, burglary, arson and threats to kill.

The Sunday World reported two weeks ago that Goodman was facing more jail time after pleading guilty to multiple breaches of a Sex Offender Order Contrary to Section 22 of the Sex Offenders Act 2001.

Goodman appeared at Dublin Circuit Court by video link last Monday where Judge Martin Nolan sentenced him to one year on each of four counts of breaching the order but the sentences were to run concurrently.

However, as Goodman has been in custody since May 2022 he has already served the sentence and walked free from prison on Monday.

He had also been sentenced to another year behind bars as recently as last December for other separate similar breaches of the sex offender order but once again as he was in custody on remand, that sentence is also now deemed to have been served.

Goodman is now back prowling the streets and is at high risk of reoffending.

The sick predator, who has several convictions related to masturbating and sexual assaults on public transport, repeatedly gets caught breaching his sex offender order which bans him from public transport.

Every time he has been released from prison in recent years he has committed more sex crimes and gardai are fearful he will return to his old habits now that he is back out.

Goodman and its conditions prohibited him from getting onto public transport or using a shared means of private transport without prior notice to gardaí but a judge said he was clearly not deterred by the order and was “something of a menace”.

This order also prevents the fiend from “attending or loitering in the immediate vicinity of or on the grounds of any educational facility where children congregate”.

Goodman has been classed by Gardaí as a “prolific offender who sexually assaults females and children”.

In March of 2013 Goodman was jailed for 10 months for fondling himself while watching girls studying in Cork City library. the incident occurred at 2pm on February 6, 2012.

Inspector Bill Duane told the court: “When he saw them look at him, he started walking closer and then walking away. He put his hands down his pants and fiddled with himself,” he said.

In July 2014 he was convicted of committing an indecent act in the ladies changing rooms of the University of Limerick’s Sports Arena.

In August 2018, Goodman told the Sunday World: “I’m not a danger to nobody” when our reporter confronted him after watching him breach his public transport ban by gett8ing on a Luas.

He initially denied he had even been on public transport before our reporter told him: “I’ve just stood behind you on [the Luas] all the way from Heuston Station.

Realising he’d been nabbed, Goodman changed tack, pleading for sympathy. He whined: I’m in a hostel. I just got out of prison. I’m taking this [the ban] up with the High Court.

He claimed he would not use public transport again.

In spite of his promise, just four hours later, we photographed Goodman breaching the order again as he boarded a Dublin Bus 185 Service in Enniskerry back to the capital.

Within days, Goodman had carried out a succession of offences including indecent exposure at a Malahide restaurant, indecent exposure on the 46a bus and a sexual assault on a woman on a bus on the Stillorgan Road.

At his sentence hearing, Judge Melanie Greally described Goodman as someone who lacked empathy, understanding or insight into his behaviour.

The court heard in the Malahide incident, one of the women noticed that the man was “almost squirming” in his seat and moving his hands quickly on his crotch while staring at her.

He had his hands down his trousers and the incident lasted for approximately 30-40 minutes.

The woman noticed two wet stains on his t-shirt when he stood up and left the restaurant without paying for his coffee. He was arrested four days later and released on bail.

One week after the other incident of exposure, Goodman masturbated on the 46a bus while staring at a woman. Later that day, he touched the breast of another woman on a bus.

He was sentenced to four years with 18 month suspended for those incidents but once he was released he returned to his old habits.