An apprentice jockey has been jailed for falsely imprisioning and sexually assaulting a woman who he offered to help after she was separated from her friends during a night out in Co Kerry.
Tralee Circuit Criminal Court heard that Maurice Fitzgerald (23), of Abbeyview, Buttevant, Co Cork, brought duct tape and scissors with him when he followed the woman after she rejected his sexual advances and left his flat.
Judge Thomas E O’Donnell said Fitzgerald made “startling admissions” with “sinister undertones” after his arrest. He told gardaí he was angry after the student rejected his advances, that he was “into bondage” and could not control his urges.
Fitzgerald pleaded guilty to five counts including false imprisonment, assault causing harm, possession of a weapon and possession of duct tape on the Dingle road in Tralee on September 20th last. He also pleaded guilty to sexual assault at his flat.
The victim had lost her phone and become separated from her friends outside a nightclub at about 2am on the night. Fitzgerald approached her and the woman believed he was “genuinely concerned for her safety”, Judge O’Donnell said.
Advances
Fitzgerald told the woman there was a party in his flat and there were two bedrooms, one of which she could sleep in. There was no party when they returned and during the night Fitzgerald entered her room, saying he could not sleep before making sexual advances and attempting to remove her clothes.
The woman left at about 4am and had walked some 1.5 miles along the Dan Spring/Dingle road when she realised she was being followed.
The court heard Fitzgerald was wearing a hoodie at the time and told the woman, who did not realise it was him, to put her hands in front of her or else she would be killed. He then placed duct tape around her.
Two men returning from night work arrived at the scene and called gardaí, who found Fitzgerald in nearby bushes. Duct tape and scissors were recovered.
In the hours before the incident, Fitzgerald had used his iPhone to search for terms such as ‘girl’, ‘taped’, and ‘gagged’, the court heard.
Premeditation
Fitzgerald was on bail at the time for a similar sexual assault in Co Tipperary. He was once a “promising jockey “ but suffered injuries, Judge O’Donnell said.
“This was a frightening ordeal for the victim, a worst nightmare scenario. There was an element of premeditation and calculation even though the victim was selected at random,” he added.
The judge gave Fitzgerald credit for his early admissions and remorse.He said the victim impact statement, in which the woman said she thought she was going to die, was “erudite and profound”.
“I honestly believed I was going to die in a terrifying, brutal way,” she said. “This was the kind of thing you read about in a newspaper never expecting it to happen to you.”
The woman had nightmares, lost trust in people and blamed herself for being gullible after the incident.
Fitzgerald is serving four years for the Tipperary sexual assault offence which occurred when he found upon a woman relieving herself in an open area.
Judge O’Donnell sentenced him to a further four years on to begin at the completion of his current sentence. The court was also asked to place Fitzgerald on the sex offenders’ register for life.