A SERIAL BURGLAR who broke into a woman’s house and repeatedly raped her in 2011 has been returned to prison after he breached the terms of suspended sentence by committing more burglaries.

Gerard Kane (43) received a 12-year sentence with the final three years suspended in 2012. He was released from prison in August 2018 and committed two burglaries in January 2019.

Last December he received a three-and-a-half year sentence with the final year suspended for these burglaries.

Guilty plea

Kane, formerly of Dominic Street, Dun Laoghaire, had pleaded guilty in 2012 at the Central Criminal Court to raping the woman at her home on June 17, 2011.

At the time of the rape Kane was on bail for breaking into the constituency office of the then Fianna Fail Minister Barry Andrews.

He had initially denied the rape charges and pleaded guilty following five days of a trial during which the victim had already given her evidence and been cross-examined. He was sentenced in November 2012 by Mr Justice Garrett Sheehan to 12 years with three suspended.

Last year Kane pleaded guilty to burglary at Dun Laoghaire Further Education Institute, burglary at Silchester Crescent, Glenageary and handling stolen property on January 20, 2019.

Dealing with the suspended portion of the 2012 sentence Mr Justice Michael White told the Central Criminal Court that Kane had tragically been released out into the community “fairly cold” and had immediate issues with rough sleeping and addiction.

Mr Justice White activated two years of the three years of the suspended term but reduced that to activation of one year to give Kane credit for time he had spent in custody on the Circuit Court charges.

The activated year will be consecutive to the sentence he is serving for the 2019 burglaries.

Psychiatric report

Patrick Reynolds BL, defending, had handed a psychiatric report into court to give a picture of his client’s mental health issues.

He said Kane had run into a number of difficulties on release in August 2018 including being homeless and unable to access a GP in relation to his medication.

He said Kane had no supports available to him, began self-medicating from the street and fell into the trap of offending again.

“In the situation he was in it was inevitable he was going to commit further offences,” said Mr Reynolds. He said Kane had also been attacked because of the nature of his offence.

Sentence hearing

At his sentence hearing on the rape charges in November 2011 the court heard that the woman was alone in her apartment at 1.30am when she was awoken by Kane who broken into her home.

During the following three hours she was raped twice by Kane who threatened to bury the victim in the back garden and said he would hang himself if she went to the gardaí.

As he was leaving he made her promise not to call gardaí, gave her a hug and asked for her number so he could take her out to dinner.

In a victim impact report the woman told the court that the week after the break-in was the worst of her life because she thought Kane might return and kill her, “like he said he would”.

She said she became paranoid and anxious and was forced to take sleeping tablets.

Kane’s defence counsel in the rape trial, Conor Devally SC, said his client had a chaotic upbringing and that his mother was an alcoholic. He said he showed some promise as a footballer but fell into drug and alcohol abuse in his mid-teens.

Counsel said the attack was “opportunistic” and not premeditated. He submitted that Kane was “somewhat institutionalised from years in prison” and that he had tried and failed to get treatment for his drug addiction.