Thursday, September 05, 2024

13 schools in Louth and East Meath named in sexual abuse Scoping Inquiry

The Scoping Inquiry into historical sexual abuse in schools run by religious orders has named 13 schools across Louth and East Meath where allegations of abuse have been made to the Inquiry.

The schools named take their place among hundreds across the country, found to have questions to answer in terms of their record in protecting children from sexual abuse.

The sheer number of local schools named in the report is shocking and and the numbers of alleged abuses and abusers, staggering.

In Drogheda, several schools are named in the report. St Joseph’s CBS primary school in Drogheda had the largest number of reported allegations of abuse, at 14, carried out by six separate alleged abusers.

St Joseph’s CBS secondary school had one alleged incident of abuse, detailed by the scoping report.

St Mary’s CBS secondary school was named as having four alleged cases of abuse, committed by two different alleged abusers, while Drogheda CBS primary school had two incidents of alleged abuse reported to the Inquiry, carried out by two different alleged abusers.

Dundalk CBS primary school had nine incidents of alleged abuse recorded by the Inquiry. Those incidents were perpetrated by five different alleged abusers.

Dundalk CBS secondary school had four alleged incidents of abuse, according to the Inquiry, involving three alleged abusers.

St Nicholas Monastery School in Dundalk was found to have four incidents of alleged abuse carried out in the period covered by the Inquiry and these were carried out by three alleged abusers.

De La Salle College in Dundalk was recorded as having two alleged incidents of abuse, uncovered by the Inquiry, which found that these indicents were carried out by two alleged abusers.

St Mary’s College secondary school in Dundalk, had nine cases of alleged abuse dealt with by the Inquiry with four alleged abusers involved in those incidents.

Outside of the urban centres of Drogheda and Dundalk, there were other incidents uncovered by the Inquiry at Louth and East Meath schools.

St Mary’s School in Drumcar had one alleged incident of abuse recorded by the Inquiry while St Michael’s College in Omeath was found by the Inquiry to have five incidents of alleged abuse, carried out by three alleged abusers.

De La Salle NS in Ardee was also found to have a single incident of alleged abuse but at the Franciscan College in Gormanston, the Inquiry made the grim discovery of some 19 alleged incidents of abuse, carried out by two separate alleged abusers.

The figures were supplied to the Scoping Inquiry by the religious orders running the schools themselves, in response to requests for a breakdown of numbers, so the true number of abuses and abusers may well be much greater..

The report says that most of the sexual abuse incidents it details happened between the 1960s and the early 1990s, with the highest number of reported incidents occurring in the early to mid-1970s.

The report heard from many survivors who said that “their childhood stopped the day the abuse started.”