Dublin man sentenced to 12 years for raping wife, with one year suspended

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

A Dublin man was sentenced on 15 January 2024 to 12 years in prison, with the final year suspended, for repeatedly raping his wife. The proceedings were reported on 15 January 2024.

A jury had found him guilty at a retrial of 11 counts of sexually assaulting his wife by penetrating her vagina with household objects. The abuse occurred at the family home on unknown dates between January 2005 and September 2014. The first trial had ended with not guilty verdicts on four counts; the jury could not agree on the remaining counts.

The State’s case was that the woman was unconscious and unable to consent. The defence case was that all the sexual acts were consensual. The man continued to maintain his innocence.

The abuse came to light in March 2019 when the woman found images her husband had taken of her on his computer. In her victim impact statement, she described the shock of discovering the images and said she had suffered anxiety, depression, sleeplessness and panic attacks.

Justice Paul Burns said the repeated rapes were an egregious breach of trust. He suspended the final year of the sentence on conditions including that the man engage in a course on sexuality and consent after release. The man had no previous convictions.