Kenneally abuse survivors give cautious welcome to move by Flanagan

Survivors of sex abuser Bill Kenneally have given a cautious welcome to the news that Minister for Justice Charlie Flanagan is to explore ways of holding a commission of investigation as quickly as possible into the handling of complaints against Kenneally by various state agencies.

Jason Clancy, whose complaint to gardaí in 2012 led to an investigation which resulted in Kenneally (67) being prosecuted and jailed for 14 years in 2016, said he welcomed media reports that Mr Flanagan was anxious to proceed with a commission of investigation as quickly as possible.

But Mr Clancy stressed that neither the six survivors, who are seeking the investigation, nor their solicitor, Darragh Mackin, had received any official notification from Mr Flanagan on how exactly he plans to proceed with holding the sought after inquiry.

“We are happy that it appears minister Flanagan has changed his mind on this because earlier this week, he issued a statement saying that he could do nothing because files had been sent to the DPP after three other victims came forward after us and he didn’t want to prejudice any possible trial,” he said.

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“But the issue that we have is that our solicitor Darragh Mackin hasn’t been told and we haven’t been told about this apparent change of tack and we are hearing about it through the media – nobody has contacted us, the victims, and that is very frustrating for us,” he said.

Statement to the media

Mr Flanagan issued a statement to the media in which he said he had a preliminary discussion with the Attorney General on the issue of holding a commission of investigation into the handling of complaints against Kenneally in the 1980s by various state agencies.

And he said he had arranged for officials from his department to work with officials from the Attorney General’s to identify a methodology to allow for the early establishment of the commission of investigation in such a way as not to prejudice any ongoing criminal investigations.

According to the statement issued by the Department of Justice, Mr Flanagan said he was “acutely aware of the pain and suffering that has been endured by the survivors of the abuse of Bill Kenneally”.

“Once a clear, workable, legally sound path to the establishment of the commission is agreed with the Attorney General’s office, the Minister will seek to meet with the victims to brief them on the new proposals and to hear their views,” said the statement.

But Mr Clancy said that they were anxious to hear exactly what it was that Mr Flanagan was proposing in terms of investigating what the victims believe was a cover up after the parents of a boy made a complaint to gardaí in 1987 about Kenneally abusing their son.

“It does look as though they are changing their position and if that proves to be the case then we have to work out a roadmap with them and a start date – it is more positive than it was a week ago but we still have quite a bit to go and we won’t be opening the champagne bottles just yet.”

Mr Mackin told The Irish Times there was nothing to prevent a commission of investigation starting to gather its evidence in private and not publishing any findings until all possible criminal matters against Kenneally have been finalised.

“A lot of these hearings could be heard in private and the inquiry could be structured in a modular format to eliminate any risk of interfering with any accused person’s right to a fair trial – it goes with the reality that there are a number of individuals who are elderly and will not be about forever.”