A Meath taxi driver has been jailed for twenty months at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court for sexually assaulting a drunk passager in south Dublin.
Liam Flynn (49) of Hermitage Glen, Kells was driving the woman home when he stopped the car and attacked her.
Judge Nolan called it a “deeply reprehsible offence” on a woman who was entitled to expect she would be taken home safely. He said Flynn had taken advantage of the woman in her drunken state.
He refused a defence application to impose a suspended sentence on the basis that the attack “was a one off fall from grace.” Judge Nolan also ordered that Flynn be registered as a sex offender.
Flynn pleaded guilty to the sexual assault of the woman near her Dublin home on December 2, 2012.
Prosecuting counsel, Gerardine Small BL, told the court that the victim was at a nightclub and had consumed a few drinks when she decided she wanted to go home.
She got in Flynn’s taxi and he took her to close to where she lived. He then got out, walked around to the back passager door and opened it. There was some dispute about whether the woman had gotten sick in the car.
Flynn then put his hand up her skirt and digitally penetrated her before “having a form of oral sex with her” against her will.
Defence counsel, Mary Rose Gearty SC, said her client has no previous convictions and is a hard working, family man. She asked the judge to take into account that registering Flynn as a sexual offender will be a punishment in itself and that he will probably never work as a taxi driver again.
She added that he is taking “all steps” to rehabilitate himself and ensure the incident never happens again.
SOURCE-IRISH NEWS
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