Former priest who sexually abused his three sisters jailed for eight years
Richard Brennan (64) previously of Rathfarnham, now living in the United States, pleaded guilty at the Central Criminal Court to 24 counts against his three sisters, including 18 of indecent assault and six charges of rape.
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He entered the guilty pleas after each of the three women had given evidence before a jury and before the final woman was about to be cross-examined.
He pleaded guilty to four sample charges of indecent assault and four rape charges against Paula Faye on dates between January 1978 and December 1981 when she was aged between 13 and 17 years old.
Brennan also pleaded guilty to 13 sample incidences of indecent assault and two charges of rape against a second sister, Catherine Wrightstone, on dates between June 1980 and December 1984 while she was aged between nine and 14 years old.
He finally pleaded guilty to indecent assault against the oldest of the sisters, Yvonne Crist, when she was about 20 years old on dates between June 1979 and June 1980.
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Brennan was between 17 and 24 years old at time of the offending.
Brennan has no previous convictions. He was ordained as a priest in 1989 and moved to the US, but later married and had a family. He returned from the US for questioning and the trial.
Earlier this month, another brother Bernard Brennan, (67), formerly of Rathfarnham, Dublin, but most recently residing in the United States, was jailed for four and half years after he admitted to sexual abuse of both Yvonne Crist and Paula Faye.
Bernard Brennan pleaded guilty to 11 counts of indecent assault in various locations within the State between 1972 and 1975. He has no previous convictions.
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Sentencing Richard Brennan on Monday, Mr Justice David Keane said it was heartening to hear the three women in victim impact statement describe themselves as survivors.
The judge said the sisters had made the 'truly courageous' decision to report their brother's crimes to the gardaí.
Mr Justice Keane said he had the most 'immense admiration' for the determination shown by the three women in bringing the case before the courts and hoped that they would get something from their brother's 'belated acceptances of guilt'. He wished them well for the future.
Mr Justice Keane said the aggravating features of the case included the particularly young ages of both Ms Faye and Ms Wrightstone at the time of the abuse against them and the fact that the abuse occurred in a place where the sisters should have felt secure. Instead, Brennan created an environment of fear and confusion, he said.
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The judge also took into account the fact that there was a pattern of frequent assaults against the younger two sisters over a lengthy period of time and that Brennan was a seminarian at the time, with particular familial responsibilities to his younger sisters.
Finally, Mr Justice Keane said there were three separate victims in the case who each have been psychologically damaged and that Brennan caused each of them significant harm.
He set headline sentences of 12 years for the rapes committed against Ms Wrightstone, and headline sentences of 10 years for the rapes committed against Ms Faye. He set headline sentences of six years against the indecent assaults against Ms Wrightstone and headline sentences of 21 months and 18 months for the indecent assaults against Ms Faye and Ms Crist.
Mr Justice Keane said he must take into consideration mitigation including what he said was a late plea entered on the ninth day of the trial. He acknowledged that Brennan has shown deep remorse and that he has apologised to each of his victim.
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He said Brennan was also entitled to significant credit for his lack of previous convictions and the fact that he co-operated with gardaí.
Mr Justice Keane said he accepted evidence that Brennan appears to have been present during some incidences of abuse carried out by his brother Bernard Brennan on both Ms Faye and Ms Crist.
He said he was also taking into account the character evidence given during the sentence hearing by Brennan's wife and testimonials handed into court by a number of other people.
Mr Justice Keane imposed a term of nine years for the rape offences carried out by Brennan against Ms Wrightstone. He imposed concurrent terms of seven and half years for the rape offences committed against Ms Faye and four and half years for the indecent assaults against Ms Wrightstone.
He imposed further concurrent terms of 16 months and 14 months for the indecent assault offences committed against Ms Faye and Ms Crist. A global sentence of nine years was backdated to March 18 last when Brennan first went into custody.
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Mr Justice Keane noted that a report from the Probation Service indicated that Brennan is willing to engage with offence focused work as deemed suitable by them and said he must 'consider the prospect of rehabilitation' upon his ultimate release from prison.
He suspended the final 12 months of the nine-year term on condition that Brennan engage with the Probation Service for a year upon his release.
He did not impose a post release supervision order after acknowledging that Brennan intends to return to the States when he leaves Ireland.
If you have been affected by any of the issues raised in this article, you can call the national 24-hour Rape Crisis Helpline at 1800-77 8888, access text service and webchat options at drcc.ie/services/helpline/ or visit Rape Crisis Help.
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Later, one of Joanne's hair ties was found among his belongings – presumably a trophy taken from his intended victim. When shown it in court, he visibly recoiled. Joanne has spoken about her traumatic experience only on a handful of occasions. She was famously interviewed by Martin Bashir in 2002, followed by a few brief press appearances around the publication of her 2006 autobiographical book, No Turning Back. Today, she is believed to be leading a low-key life back in her hometown of Huddersfield, where she was most recently employed as a social worker. Now in her 50s, she is reportedly something of a recluse. She has never married nor had a family of her own. For years, the Falconios were close to Joanne, protesting her innocence and comparing her to a 'daughter'. 'We still see her but our conversations remain private,' Peter's mother said in 2020. It is, in many ways, astonishing that in the two decades since Murdoch was convicted, police are no closer to finding Peter's remains. A well at a cattle station close to where he was shot was searched in 2014 and 2019, at the behest of his mother, but nothing was found despite a five-day operation. In 2017, an anonymous letter sent to a Darwin newspaper claimed Peter's body had been cut up and placed in bin bags, which were given to an associate of Murdoch's to dissolve in acid and dispose of in a river in Perth. The letter claimed the associate ignored the instructions and buried the bags, unopened, in a remote part of Western Australia instead. Some have suggested that, in the grip of a debilitating illness, Murdoch himself may have forgotten the precise whereabouts of his victim. Whatever the truth, Peter's killer's heartless silence caused untold pain and suffering to the Falconio family. Though Joan and Luciano, with two of their sons, travelled to Australia for Murdoch's trial in 2005, ill health has prevented them from returning in recent years. Their youngest son has never been. In a poignant statement read in court, Joan spoke of her 'torment and constant physical pain' after losing Peter. At times, she feared her marriage would collapse and her family would be torn apart. She developed awful anxiety attacks, constantly having to see or check on her three surviving sons to ensure they were safe. 'The pain will never go from me,' she said. 'I think of Peter every minute of every day.' His life, she added, had 'stopped on a lonely road'. 'He was only 28 years old and had so much living left to do.' As the anniversary of their beloved son's disappearance passes once again, Joan and Luciano will have him on their minds more than ever. All they have ever wanted is to bring him home – off that lonely road and back to Huddersfield where he belongs. It seems a cruel twist of fate that this, too, is the week the one man who could have alleviated their pain has died, taking his darkest secret with him.
