Judge angry at lack of treatment in jail for rapist
A HIGH Court judge said it was “appalling” that a rapist will be released next October without getting the therapy he ordered for the man when he jailed him in 1996.
Mr Justice Dermot Kinlen directed that the transcript of a review hearing at the Central Criminal Court for Alan McNeill (32), of Rahoon Park, Galway, be sent to the Minster for Justice.
`He is going to be let out no better than when he went in and it is all due to financial reasons in a country that prides itself for its humanity and is in a financial boom but cannot provide this treatment,” he said.
Mr Justice Kinlen said he asked for McNeill to be given treatment in prison so that he could be given hope and a chance to rebuild his life when his sentence was over.
McNeill was jailed in March 1996 for six years for raping a 14-year-old boy after a cannabis-smoking session on May 13, 1995.
McNeill had previously served four years of a six-year rape sentence imposed on him in England. He went to England again after the Galway assault but returned voluntarily to facethe charge and told the court his crime was “horrible.”
Mr Justice Kinlen heard in March 1996 that McNeill had offered the victim and a friend a lift in his car and told them his name was “Alan”. He drove them to a shed down a country road where he rolled “joints” which they all smoked.
McNeill then took the victim back to the car, leaving the other boy in the shed.
He offered the victim £50 if he showed him his “privates” but when the boy resisted McNeill grabbed him and said: “We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” before raping him.
He then drove both boys to a location near their home and gave them a cigarette box with his telephone number on it.
They identified him from photographs and he was arrested.
