A woman and her partner jailed for a combined 33 years for the rape and sexual abuse of her five-year-old daughter and three-and-a-half-year-old son are to remain behind bars after their convictions were upheld by the Court of Appeal. However, in delivering the ruling on behalf of the three-judge court on Friday, Ms Justice Tara Burns said that the eight-year delay between the investigation and trial phases of the case was “truly shocking”. She added that all of the authorities dealing with child sex cases, including the guards, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the courts, “must make better efforts to ensure that cases are dealt with expeditiously”.
Ms Justice Burns said that none of the grounds of appeal pursued at hearing could be upheld. The 41-year-old woman and 53-year-old man had denied a number of offences of rape, oral rape, sexual assault, sexual exploitation, reckless endangerment and false imprisonment of the children at two locations in Connacht on dates between October 2012 and September 2014. READ MORE Dublin taxi driver found guilty of raping two female passengers This week Rhasidat Adeleke performed, and the people spoke Three women given suspended sentences in connection with murder of showjumper Katie Simpson Ukrainian refugees ‘very upset’ at being moved to a different town in Co Clare The two cannot be named in order to protect the identities of the two children.
Both the man and the woman were found guilty at the Central Criminal Court .
