‘TRAPPED’ | 

Face of vile paedophile who abused daughters of murdered Rebecca French

“Mum would turn in her grave if she knew what he did to us after she was murdered”

Today at 09:00

This is the vile paedophile who preyed on the grieving daughters of murdered mum Rebecca French.

James ‘Scooper’ Murphy, the partner of Rebecca’s sister Rachel, repeatedly sexually assaulted Kayah Anderson and Tia Arekion after the youngsters were sent to live with them following the murder in 2009.

Rebecca’s body was discovered in the boot of an abandoned burning car outside Wexford town on October 9, 2009.

Pervert Murphy has been jailed for 20 months after Judge Alice Doyle heard he’d stuck his hands down then 12-year-old Tia’s pants and repeatedly pinched and squeezed Kayah’s breasts and nipples from the age of 10.

“Mum would turn in her grave if she knew what he did to us after she died,” a distraught Tia this week told the Sunday World.

“He was meant to look after us. But he targeted us from the moment we went to live with them.

“Him slapping us on the bums became so normalized in the house.

“And even though we knew it was weird, we had to put up with it.

“We were in a new family, so we just tried to fit in.

“But we didn’t like it.

“And we were never checked up on by social workers — not once!

“He was an alcoholic the day we walked in that door

Shockingly, said Tia, a number of people in Wexford town supported Murphy.

In one text seen by the Sunday World, a person known to the couple texted Kayah and said: “Very, very disappointed with the way you have treated Scooper and Rachel.

“Twelve years ago, they took you into their home and loved you like their own.

“You wouldn’t have had such a great loving family if it hadn’t have been for them.

“He made us out to be liars to the whole town.

“And that’s why we waived our anonymity.

“Because he spread lies the whole time and we couldn’t deal with that anymore … walking around the town being made to feel like we were liars.”

Tia said the thing that makes her most angry is that she has, for the second time, lost a family because of Murphy’s actions.

“This had split the whole family,” she said. “And that’s the hardest thing for us.

“There are people who still think that this is all our fault.

They want it swept under the carpet.

“I just wish my mum was still here … because then, none of this would ever have happened!”