A serial child-abuser who lured a 10-year-old girl into the grounds of a convent to sexually assault her by asking for her help in looking for a missing puppy was jailed for seven years yesterday.
James Lombard (37), from the Blarney Street-Sunday's Well area of Cork, pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting the young girl on February 20th near the city centre.
Cork Circuit Criminal Court heard the girl was on the way back from Mass at 11am on February 20th, 2005, when her mother asked her to go to a local shop to check the Lotto numbers.
She was approached by Lombard at Tower Street. He asked for her assistance in looking for a missing puppy, which led them to the grounds of a local convent.
Det Sgt Declan O'Sullivan said Lombard then changed his story and told the child he was a doctor. He removed her boots, trousers and underwear and attempted to place his hands between her legs. The child resisted and ran home, telling her mother what had happened.
Det Sgt O'Sullivan said Lombard was the prime suspect in the case based on the modus operandi used on the morning of the assault. He was the subject of a Garda search at the time of the assault, as he had absconded earlier that month on the last day of his trial for sexually assaulting seven young boys.
He was unanimously convicted by the jury in his absence.
Lombard was apprehended by gardaí on February 28th, 2005. In April he pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting another seven boys and two girls aged between four and 10.
On May 31st, he was given a seven-year sentence, with two years suspended, for sexually assaulting 16 children over 16 months in fast food restaurants, swimming pools and sports grounds in Cork.
He was arrested in connection with the convent assault on May 11th.
The court was told Lombard made a full and frank confession in relation to the attack on the 10-year-old girl.
Blaise O'Carroll, defending, said his client was deeply remorseful for his actions. He apologised on his behalf to the girl and her family. Lombard readily accepted his part in the attack and had pleaded guilty at the first available opportunity.
In sentencing, Judge Seán O'Donnabháin said the demons which possessed Lombard in the 1980s and 1990s were still there.
"Can any more appalling transgression of another human being be imagined?" he said. "The bottom line is you are a danger to society. You are possessed of some deep underlying psychological fault and no effort has been made to address that fault."
He jailed Lombard for seven years to run consecutively with the seven-year sentence he is currently serving. He also ordered that he be placed on the sex offenders list for the rest of his life.
Lombard was first arrested by gardaí on September 4th, 1994, in connection with sex offences. Over the next eight days he made three detailed statements in which he admitted abusing children.
A file was sent to the Director of Public Prosecutions but when gardaí went to arrest him in March 1995, he had left Ireland.
Following extensive inquiries through Interpol, gardaí located Lombard in jail in England, where he was serving a sentence for a similar offence under the name John Kelleher.
He was extradited to Ireland in June 2004 and went on trial last February.