A victim of a predatory former scout leader from Donegal has told his abuser “the world is a safer place” with him locked up.
Martin Joseph, known as ‘Joe’, Cullen, will be sentenced at Letterkenny Circuit Court next week for a series of offences against young boys.
Cullen, now a 64-year-old with an address at Colehill, Newtowncunningham, was brought before Judge Roderick Maguire by prison officers from Midlands Prison, where he has been in custody since being found guilty of a range of offences.
Last July, following a five-day trial, Cullen was found guilty of seven counts of sexual assault against five young boys over a 14-year-period between 1993 and 2007 at locations in County Donegal.
The assaults did not occur during the course of his role as a scout leader.
Cullen will also be sentenced for a charge of sexual exploitation after the court heard that he made another young boy watch him masturbate.
All seven charges from the trial were contrary to section 2 of the Criminal Law (Rape) (Amendment) Act, 1990 as amended by section 37 of the Sexual Offenders Act, 2001. Cullen had pleaded not guilty when he was arraigned.
Cullen touched the boys, while he was also charged with showing some of the boys pornography on a phone and causing them to believe that they were likely to be subjected to such an impact. Some of the incidents occurred while he was engaged in various activities with the boys.
One victim said he was “about seven or eight years old” when the offending began. The victim said he remembered Cullen telling him that he would buy him something new and this comment “was something that stuck with me for years”.
Another of the victims told how Cullen would shake hands tightly with them until they would say “I am your friend”.
Some of the complainants said they were between eight years old and 13 years old when Cullen showed them pornography on an old Nokia phone.
The witnesses told how it was only in later years that each discovered they had been sexually assaulted at various times by Cullen.
The mother of one of the victims told the court that when the incidents were disclosed, she did not tell her husband as he would have “gone mad”. She said she also kept the incidents to herself as she did not think other people would believe them.
Another mother told the trial that she simply didn’t know what to do but that perhaps she should have gone to the authorities. She said: “I was hoping somebody else would tell but that it wouldn’t have to be me.”
A sibling of a victim told how Cullen would always have been “touchy, feely” but that she didn’t realise at the time that it was wrong and always thought he was just a “big child”. She said that she was not personally making a complaint against the accused as she did not remember anything specific happening to her.
At a sentencing hearing at Letterkenny courthouse, Detective Garda Bobby Carey outlined the case to the Barrister for the State, Ms Fiona Crawford BL.
One victim recalled feeling “very panicked and scared” after the offending while another remembered being “in shock” as Cullen “laughed”.
Detective Garda Bobby Carey and Detective Garda Eoin Waters. (North West Newspix)
Another of Cullen’s victims informed detectives how he told Cullen several times: “Don’t ever touch me there again”.
One young boy described how he “kept my eyes closed and curled up in a ball” after being sexually assaulted by Cullen.
In a victim impact statement, that victim said that what happened to him was “unimaginable” and left him feeling “numbed and scared”.
“The fear I felt for many years was overwhelming,” he said. “Who would believe a child over an adult?”
“I have chosen to read out my statements to finally feel free and move forward with my life in a positive way. Today, I am not the scared young boy; I am a grown man who faces his fears head-on.”
A second victim said he felt “fear and confusion” and relayed how the incidents “affected me deeply”.
He said memories would come back at times and “haunt me for a while”. He said he felt “guilt and anger that no young person should have to carry” and added: “What was taken from me, I will never get back. The impact is still felt today. I hope by speaking today that my voice is heard.”
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Victim impact statements from three other victims were read out in court by Ms Crawford.
One said that due to their experience with Cullen that the word friend “almost became a bad thing”. He said the episode left them feeling “alone and without meaningful connections”.
He said he felt “guilt and shame” and was in a “never-ending cycle of depression”. “I want to feel normal and whole again,” he said.
A further victim recalled having suicidal ideation and outlined that they still feel uncomfortable if alone in a small area such as a car.
“The whole thing made me question who I was in many ways,” he added. “It didn’t just affect me in a moment. It changed the direction of my life. It took away my sense of safety. I still feel the effects every day.”
A man sexually abused by Cullen when he was just seven or eight said he was “unsure” how he felt at the time, “but I knew it was wrong”. The incidents had left him “uncomfortable and I felt powerless”.
“It makes me feel ashamed even though I did nothing wrong,” he said. “I can say that I am so happy that this predator can’t do this to anyone else. The world is a safer place with him locked up.”
Cullen entered a guilty plea in respect of a charge of child exploitation, contrary to section 3 (2) and 3 (3) of the Child Trafficking and Pornography Act, 1998. This related to an offence between 2008 and 2010 at a location in Co Donegal where he forced a child to watch him masturbating.
A nolle prosequi was entered for a similar charge with the guilty plea accepted on a full facts basis.
The court heard that a jury was empanelled for this charge, but Cullen pleaded guilty as a trial was about to begin. However, Cullen then indicated that he wished to change that plea, but no application to that end was made.
The court heard that Cullen asked sex-related questions of the teenager, who “felt very awkward and didn’t know what to think”. Cullen masturbated in front of the boy on two occasions.
The boy felt “very awkward” and wondered why Cullen was doing this in front of him. The victim later confided in his mother about what had happened.
In a victim impact statement, this man told of the “immense emotional effect” this had on him.
“I felt very vulnerable in a situation of not knowing what to do,” he said. “I felt completely taken advantage of.”
He said what affects him most is that he didn’t tell anyone and added that Cullen indicating that he was changing his plea heightened his anxiety.
“I don’t understand how it can happen that he pleaded guilty and was going to change,” he said. “I feel scared to know that people can be taken advantage of so easily.”
Cullen was first arrested at his home in December 2017 for an offence under the Criminal Law Rape Amendment Act for sexual assault and questioned a number of times about the allegations.
The investigation was conducted by Detective Garda Carey and his colleague Detective Garda Eoin Waters. During all interviews, Cullen denied that anything had happened with any of the complainants.
At one stage, Cullen said the accusations were false and he told the detectives: “I refuse to answer questions that I know nothing about.”
The court heard that Cullen – who was represented by Mr James McGowan SC, with Mr Peter Nolan BL, instructed by solicitor Mr Donough Cleary – now accepts the verdict of the jury.
In a brief letter of apology, read to the court by Mr Nolan, Cullen said that he wished to “apologise for all that has happened and for all the pain and suffering it caused”. Cullen said if he could turn back time, he would.
Mr Nolan told the court that Cullen’s guilty plea in respect of the child exploitation charge “did save (the victim) the experience of having to be a witness and be cross-examined in open court”.
Mr Nolan said that Cullen has no previous convictions and was a man with a good work record, working most of his life in a meat factory and other occupations.
Cullen, added Mr Nolan, “came to the insight eventually” and asked the court to take into account the time already spent in custody by his client.