A Tipperary man has been jailed for eight years for the rape of “a vulnerable and intoxicated” young woman in a Dublin hotel.
The Central Criminal Court heard that Dermott Brett of Sweet Auburn, Carrickbeg, Carrick-on-Suir had pleaded not guilty to one count rape at the InterContinental Hotel, Dublin on January 11, 2019.
56 year old Brett had been found guilty in May of this year but still maintains his innocence.
The woman was a 20-year-old university student at the time.
The court heard that she had been out with friends but was asked to leave a Dublin pub because she was so intoxicated. She attended at a nearby fast-food outlet where she could be seen on CCTV footage in such a drunken state that she is incapable of standing upright.
The woman’s friends hailed a taxi to take her home but the woman got out of the taxi shortly afterwards, unbeknownst to her friends.
She then met with Brett and he claimed that he was concerned for her welfare because there were a number of men around who had an interest in her.
Passing sentence yesterday, Ms Justice Eileen Creedon said Brett claimed he had gone to the woman’s assistance and acted as a good Samaritan. She noted that Brett still maintains his innocence and claims that he and the woman got naked together in the hotel room and “fooled around”.
She noted that he is a married man with children of his own and was considerably older than the woman with more “life experience”.
The judge said the offence warranted a headline sentence of 10 years before she imposed a sentence of nine years, having taken into account mitigating factors including Brett’s lack of previous convictions.
Ms Justice Creedon suspended the final year of the sentence on strict conditions including that he engage with the Probation Service for a year upon his release and engage in a sex offender’s treatment programme. He was placed on the sex offender’s register.
