Ireland: at the deaf school in Cabra, one man was Garda-investigated with no recorded outcome, and three more were let go without the Gardai ever being told

Proceedings

1. 1990-01-01 · official findings — a live Garda investigation with no recorded outcome, alongside three further cases with no Garda involvement at all

   Ireland — Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (Ryan Report, 2009), Vol. 1 ch. 13. In the early 1990s a boy witnessed his House Parent, Mr Moore, engaged in sexual activity with another resident boy; a Garda investigation ran alongside an Eastern Health Board inquiry and a St Clare's Unit clinical assessment, ultimately screening 70 past and present pupils, but Mr Moore was dismissed from employment approximately two months in and no conviction, charge, or trial outcome is recorded anywhere in the chapter. In the course of that same investigation, allegations of sexual abuse emerged against a Christian Brother, Br Farber (Br Farber 'did not return to Cabra' — no investigation by Congregation or State is recorded), and against a second Brother, Br Boucher, whom the school authorities admitted they did NOT report to the Gardai, stating the complaint 'was not very clear' — a characterisation the Commission rejected outright, finding the allegation of fondling 'plainly a matter for the Gardai to pursue.' A third case, staff supervisor Mr Lynch, accused in the early 1980s of showing 'dirty books' to and abusing a boy, resigned the same day he was confronted; the Commission states directly, 'The Gardai were not informed, so there was no criminal investigation,' and that he was free to 'seek work with children in a different facility.'

Documented coercion mechanisms

• a documented decision NOT to inform the Gardai of a clear allegation of a Brother fondling a child's genitals, on the stated ground that the complaint 'was not very clear'
• acceptance of a staff member's resignation in place of any inquiry into whether abuse occurred
• a residential school for deaf children where communication with outside authorities was already structurally difficult, compounding the isolation of the boys