18 intellectually disabled residents at an HSE owned care home in Donegal have suffered sexual abuses continuously for a period of 13 years. It was with the full knowledge of the management and staff who did nothing in particular to stop the abuses, a recent report has found.
The report by HSE’s National Independent Review Panel (NIRP) attained by The Irish Times shows how the management failed to address the issue for almost one and half decades until a whistle-blower contacted the local TD to reveal what was happening at the care home.
The abuses were carried out by another resident, given the pseudonym ‘Brandon’ in the report. These included molestation, entering residents’ beds at night, exposing himself, prolonged and loud masturbation close to residents, and possibly rape, The Irish Times reports. Brandon died last year.
The management and staff had full knowledge of Brandon’s behavior and instead of taking strict actions, they were just shifting him from one ward to another which gave him further chances of molestation on new residents. Most of his victims were mentally challenged to speak up.
The report also finds the Ard Gréine Court complex and Sean O’Hare Unit in St Joseph’s hospital in Stranorlar had been run with a “disregard for residents’ rights”.
The local HSE team had never reported any incident to Gardai and the management also didn’t timely notified about the abuses to families of the residents.
It was in 2016, a whistle-blower contacted the local TD Thomas Pringle about the abuses and he then brought the issue to the higher HSE authorities. Later in 2018 December, the HSE appointed an independent commission to inquire and make a report of the incidents.