Donegal man jailed for eleven years for sexual abuse of two teenage girls

By Isabel Hayes

A Donegal man who sexually abused two teenage girls more than 25 years ago, regularly creeping into one girl’s bed in the night to rape her, has been jailed for eleven years.

Andrew Robert John McElhinney (59) of Muntermellon, Hornhead, Dunfanaghy was found guilty by a Central Criminal Court jury of seven of the nine counts against him following a trial in Monaghan last July.

He was found guilty of three counts of sexual assault and three sample counts of raping the first girl along with one count of sexually assaulting the second girl.

The abuse occurred on dates between May 1998 and September 2000 and occurred almost entirely in McElhinney’s then home, where he lived with his wife and young children at the time. He was 19 years older than his victims, who were aged around 14 and 16 at the time of the offending.

The court heard the women wished for McElhinney to be named, but did not wish to be named themselves.

Sentencing him today, Mr Justice Patrick McGrath said there was very little by way of mitigation except for the fact that McElhinney has no other serious previous convictions.

He noted that although counsel for McElhinney at one point told the court he accepts the verdict of the jury, he has since said he maintains his innocence. He has twice sacked his legal team and did not cooperate with the Probation Service.

He represented himself today and said he did not wish to address the court in mitigation.

Mr Justice McGrath said it was clear McElhinney’s abuse of his victims had a serious and lasting effect on them, noting they were children at the time and there was a clear breach of trust.

Taking into account his lack of admissions, the disparity in age at the time and the repeated nature of the offending, he set a headline sentence of 12 years, which he reduced to eleven years.

A local garda detective previously told Monica Lawlor BL, prosecuting, that the teenagers regularly stayed in McElhinney’s house to help mind the children.

The first complainant, against whom most of the guilty verdicts relate to, stayed with McElhinney and his wife for a period one summer in the late 1990s. During this time, McElhinney started coming into the room where she was sleeping, getting into bed with her and sexually assaulting her.

This abuse gradually progressed to rape, the court heard.

The girl would change bedrooms or sleep in the same bed as one of his children to try and avoid McElhinney, but he would often bring the sleeping child to another room before returning to abuse the teenager.

The court heard McElhinney and his wife drank a lot and she was often passed out when the abuse occurred. He also plied the girl with vodka and would buy her cigarettes. On one occasion, he raped her when they were staying in a caravan park.

The abuse occurred again the following summer on about three or four occasions. It ended when the teenager stopped staying over in the house.

In her victim impact statement, which she read out in court, the woman said she was left with feelings of self-hatred as a result of the abuse, and hated looking in the mirror or at photographs of herself. She said McElhinney’s behaviour “was always inappropriate” from when she was young.

“You removed my power to say no,” she said.

She said despite the difficult legal process taking its toll on her mental health, she would still do it again. “I have my voice back and no-one can take it away again,” she said.

In relation to the second complainant, the court heard McElhinney was found guilty of one count of sexually assaulting her by tweaking her nipple when she was sleeping over in their house to babysit the children.

In her victim impact statement, this woman said McElhinney regularly plied her with alcohol and she had no idea how often he came into her room when she was sleeping.

She said she suffered from insomnia, anxiety and depression as a result of the abuse and has trouble trusting men. She said she has been in therapy since 2017 and has developed better coping skills.

The court heard that the women went to gardaí in 2017 and McElhinney was arrested and interviewed. He has a couple of minor previous convictions for a road traffic offence and theft. He is separated from his wife and his children are now adults.

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