A MEMBER OF the Irish Defence Forces will be sentenced next January for the rape of a fellow soldier at a Dublin hotel three years ago.

Kielan Mooney (30) of Bloomfield Park, Derry, was convicted following a trial at the Central Criminal Court earlier this month on a count of anal rape, oral rape and rape of the woman at the Dublin hotel on July 26, 2021.

He had pleaded not guilty to a total of six charges, two charges of rape, two charges of oral rape, a charge of anal rape and a charge of sexual assault. The jury failed to reach a verdict on the three remaining charges.

The now 24-year-old woman, who is also a serving solider of the Irish Defence Forces, has indicated that while she is content for Mooney to be named in the reporting of the case, she does not wish to be identified.

Garda Riche Moyston told Patrick Gageby SC, prosecuting, that the woman was out socialising with other army members that night when they met a group of soldiers from Mooney’s barracks in Donegal.

She and Mooney got speaking and they decided to go back to the woman’s friend’s hotel room in the city centre.

The woman told the trial that Mooney anally raped her in her friend’s hotel room. She said she had asked him to stop but he did not.

Afterwards she went to the bathroom and was crying. She managed to text her friend. Mooney came into the room and asked her what was wrong before he took her by the hand and brought her back into the bedroom.

Mooney then forced the woman to perform oral sex on him before he pushed her onto the bed and raped her.

The woman was very distressed. She managed to get back into the bathroom and phoned her friend who told her that she and two other male friends were nearly at the hotel.

Gda Moyston said when the woman’s friends arrived Mooney was dressed. The woman was hysterical and crying. The two men forced Mooney out of the room and the gardaí were called.

Mooney was arrested by arrangement the following month. He claimed there had been no anal sex and said whatever other sexual activity had occurred was consensual.

The woman read her victim impact statement into the record. She said that night changed her life and she would not wish what happened to her on anyone.

She said her life had only got going at that point. “I was getting the chance to live the life of a 21-year-old, just having a good time,” she said.

She said she caused “shock and heartbreak” within her family when she disclosed the rape.

The woman said she never expected a man to take away something from her in such a selfish way and described how she struggled with her mental health in the aftermath of the rape.

“I did not want to go through with life anymore,” the woman continued before she added that it impacted on her work as she could not perform her duties. She had been nominated for a course which would have meant a promotion in work but she was unable to participate.

She said “the actions of another person” were continually impacting on her life as she also lost all interest in the hobbies she used to enjoy.

The woman said that through counselling and therapy she has been “allowed to live my life again”.

She spoke of how traumatic she found the trial, seeing Mooney all around the courthouse and waiting on the jury’s verdict.

“I never believed that something over one night could shatter everything I thought and believed in – myself and my future. The hurt does not just disappear,” the woman said.

She said the support she has received from many people have “helped remind me that I am worth more than someone else’s despicable actions”.

She specifically thanked the gardaí and the various supports services in the army. She said her appreciation for those that helped her in the army “needs to be recorded”.

The woman also thanked the Rape Crisis Centre, “who reassured me of my safety” and expressed her thanks to her family and friends.

Justice Tony Hunt thanked the woman for taking the time to read her victim impact statement. He said he hoped that the vindication she got from the jury would help her going forward.

“You owe it to yourself to think of yourself now going forward,” he said.

Justice Hunt remanded Mooney in continuing custody and adjourned the case to January 20 next for sentence.

Gda Moyston agreed with Dominic McGinn SC, defending, that Mooney was fully co-operative with gardaí and answered all their questions.

He agreed that it was his understanding that Mooney’s career with the army is now “effectively over”.

Mr McGinn asked the court to accept that his client did not set out that evening to commit a rape and submitted that there was “consent to some activity” between Mooney and the woman.

“Every rape is serious and every rape demands punishment,” Mr McGinn said.

Counsel said it was “a complicated case for the jury” because at the outset the woman was consenting to some level of activity.

He acknowledged that a person has a right at any stage to say that I do not consent to this and his client “blatantly ignored that”, counsel said.

“He is criminally liable for what he did and what he did would be viewed as entirely reprehensible by society,” Mr McGinn continued.

“His conduct resulted in injury, trauma and a lifelong impact on her and he deserves to be punished for that,” counsel continued before he asked the court to accept that it is clear that Mooney “is not a bad person”.

Mr Justice Hunt said young men put themselves in the unfortunate position Mooney has put himself in but added there is nobody responsible for it but Mooney himself.

“He has basically no previous convictions. He has served in the defence forces, I am prepared to accept that there is positive aspects to his good character that once was and is now gone.”

Mr McGinn said there were seven affidavits before the court sworn in by a wide variety of people from the community and his family, outlining that he is an upstanding member of society and that his actions that night were completely out of character.

Counsel said his client is a father of five children, ranging in age from three to 12 years old.

He asked the court to accept that this offence would not have happened if Mooney had not been intoxicated and suggested that “alcohol seems to be a catalyst”.

Mr Justice Hunt said it was his understanding from the evidence at the trial that “all of these people went out at the same time and had roughly the same amount to drink – why is he [Mooney] so different?”

Mr McGinn asked the court to accept that his client has lost his good character, his career is at an end and that his children will be without their father for some time.