Court of Appeal dismisses former judge Gerard O’Brien’s appeal against attempted rape and sexual assault convictions

This report is a localnews.ie summary based on public court reporting and records; sources are listed below.

The Court of Appeal on July 10th, 2026 dismissed an appeal by Gerard O’Brien (61), a former Circuit Court judge, against his convictions for one count of attempted rape and eight counts of sexual assault involving six young men. The court did not uphold any of his grounds of appeal.

O’Brien was convicted by a Central Criminal Court jury in December 2023. The offences occurred in Dublin between March 1991 and November 1997, when he was a teacher at CBC Monkstown and aged between 27 and 33. The victims were then aged between 17 and 24, and four of them were students or former students of his. According to the Court of Appeal judgment, he was sentenced to a cumulative term of six years' imprisonment, with the final 21 months suspended. He resigned as a Circuit Court judge, having been appointed in 2015.

His counsel had argued that the trial judge's instructions to the jury were confusing and weighted against the defence. The Court of Appeal held that the issues raised about the charge, whether taken individually or cumulatively, were not legally incorrect and did not make the charge unbalanced. It found that the charge was more detailed than usual but not unfair. The court also rejected the argument that the trial judge erred in refusing separate trials, and found that evidence of recent complaint was properly admitted. The three-judge court was presided over by Ms Justice Tara Burns.