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\n A college student who was raped while she was sleeping by a trainee pilot she encountered during a night out has said while he was building his future, she was \u201ctrying to survive mine\u201d.\n <\/p>\n
Chris Brady (31) of Cornstown, Ashbourne, Co. Meath was convicted of rape at his home in May 2023 following a Central Criminal Court trial last month.<\/p>\n
Eoghan Cole SC, prosecuting, told the court that the woman wishes to retain her right to anonymity, but is happy for Brady to be named in reporting the case.<\/p>\n
Brady was\u00a0today jailed for six years.<\/p>\n
Garda Sergeant Jessica Hargadon gave evidence that the woman and two friends were socialising and had some drinks. They went to Coppers nightclub where her friends encountered Brady and his friend. The woman was introduced to him at the end of the night and thought he was interested in one of her friends.\u00a0<\/p>\n
They all decided to continue the night and went to Brady\u2019s home, where he later asked to kiss the woman.<\/p>\n
She said \u201cno\u201d and that she thought he wanted to be with her friend. He said he wanted to be with her as her friend wasn\u2019t paying him enough attention.<\/p>\n
She later went to sleep in one room, while her friends slept in different rooms.\u00a0 She was woken up by Brady raping her.<\/p>\n
She told him to get off or pushed him off. She asked him to let her sleep and turned on her side. He said something like \u201cyou\u2019re scaring me, I feel like I\u2019ve attacked you. I\u2019m sorry\u201d. She thought she could hear him masturbating beside her.<\/p>\n
He tried again to have sex with her again momentarily. She told him to leave, which he did.<\/p>\n
The woman called a friend and told her what had happened. She then left the room and went to stay with one of her friends in another room for the rest of the night.<\/p>\n
There was a minor road traffic incident while Brady was driving the women back to their homes. The victim showed a note on her phone to her friends: \u201cI hate him, I woke up and he was having sex with me\u201d during this incident.<\/p>\n
She made a complaint to gardai two days later and was also examined at a sexual assault treatment unit.<\/p>\n
Brady co-operated with the investigation and made a voluntary prepared statement in August 2024.<\/p>\n
He claimed that the woman flirted with him and initiated consensual sexual activity. He said he woke up to find the woman kissing him, then they engaged in consensual sex which the woman stopped due to having a romantic interest in someone else.<\/p>\n
Brady has not come to other negative attention, the court heard.\u00a0 He has no previous convictions and has been in custody since July 1, when the jury returned its verdict.<\/p>\n
Reading her victim impact statement, the woman said what was supposed to be an \u201cordinary night out\u201d with friends was turned into \u201csomething ugly\u201d.<\/p>\n
Her studies and her experience of college were negatively affected by what happened and she now sees the world as a cruel place.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile you were building your future, I was trying to survive mine\u201d.<\/p>\n
The woman said she chose to come to court alone to spare her family from seeing her being cross-examined. In contrast, Brady had \u201cfamily outside those doors waiting\u201d.<\/p>\n
She said the difference was \u201cbecause I was carrying a different story\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cYours came with no shame at all. Mine came wrapped in shame and that changes what you can ask someone to sit through.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said Brady \u201cused my story as your own\u201d in his statement to gardai.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe evil it takes to do that is incredible.\u00a0 You didn\u2019t put together a simple story. You knew what happened and still you decided to sit down and write what sounded to me like a sick fantasy\u201d.<\/p>\n
She said hearing Brady\u2019s version of the night was the \u201cbiggest shock\u201d and there was \u201cno remorse or guilt in making up a story like that\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow does a person actually go into bedroom, see a girl sleeping and think that\u2019s his chance. How does someone take what they want,\u201d she said, saying that question has \u201chaunted\u201d her.<\/p>\n
She said hearing Brady\u2019s version didn\u2019t make what happened any easier but helped to answer her question of how someone can have sex with a sleeping person \u201cbecause they don\u2019t see anything else but a sleeping body\u201d.<\/p>\n
Testimonials from Brady\u2019s father, siblings, a family friend and a coach from Ashbourne GAA club were handed to the court.<\/p>\n
Sean Guerin SC, defending, noted that the testimonials refer to Brady as hard-working, trustworthy and supportive of others, and someone involved in charity fundraising and sport.<\/p>\n
Mr Guerin said that in the current circumstances, it appeared to be subject to criticism for someone to provide a testimonial.<\/p>\n
He noted that that it is an established part of the process for the court to know of a defendant\u2019s character apart from the offence, and that the testimonials acknowledge his client\u2019s conviction.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Brady has diagnoses of dyslexia and ADHD.<\/p>\n
Mr Guerin said his client trained as a pilot, but was unable to work as he could not secure garda clearance. Brady then qualified and worked as a flight instructor, until the same vetting issue emerged.<\/p>\n
He submitted that the conviction\u2019s consequences will be \u201ccareer-long\u201d for Brady and this is an \u201cunusual and significant\u201d mitigating factor.<\/p>\n
He said his instructions are that Brady will not appeal the conviction.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn that sense, he accepts verdict of the jury. He fought the case on basis of an account he gave and<\/p>\n
that\u2019s as far as I can put the matter,\u201d Mr Guerin said.<\/p>\n
He submitted that his client has \u201cgood prospects for rehabilitation\u201d.<\/p>\n
Imposing sentence, Ms Justice Melanie Greally said the court considered the sexual violation of a sleeping person to be \u201cintrinsically at a higher level\u201d.<\/p>\n
She noted that the will of the sleeping person is \u201cso totally and completely overborne that they have no power to resist or refuse\u201d and that the person violated can never know the full extent of what happened.<\/p>\n
She said the second act of penetration, however brief, was also aggravating along with evidence of \u201cgaslighting\u201d by Brady through saying \u201cyou\u2019re scaring me, I feel like I\u2019ve attacked you. I\u2019m sorry\u201d.<\/p>\n
The judge also noted the \u201cprofound\u201d impact on the woman. She said the woman\u2019s impact statement \u201cspoke of exposing and intrusive nature of trial process\u201d and her feeling of humiliation. The judge said the woman \u201ccorrectly observed that it could have been avoided if Brady had admitted his guilt\u201d.<\/p>\n
She set a headline sentence of eight years, which she reduced to six years to take account of the mitigation.<\/p>\n
Ms Justice Greally said the woman had \u201cdemonstrated admirable courage, strength and resilience\u201d during the case and that the court hoped the end of proceedings would bring some comfort and the potential for future healing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A college student who was raped while she was sleeping by a trainee pilot she encountered during a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4263,4262,42,3323,4259,4258,4265,4266,4264,4260,4261,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-573143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-drogheda-radio","tag-dundalk-radio","tag-headlines","tag-job-search","tag-lm-fm","tag-lmfm","tag-lmfm-breakfast-show","tag-lmfm-late-lunch","tag-lmfm-podcast","tag-louth-radio","tag-meath-radio","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}