October 2013 Twisted paedo ex-garda: ‘I’m no threat to girls’ school’ A PAEDOPHILE former garda claims he is no longer a danger to children despite moving into a home beside a girls’ school. Kieran O’Halloran was jailed twice for trying to organise sex sessions with children. The second offence occurred just one year after he was released for the first offence. He offered two prostitutes up to €10,000 to source the children and asked one to organise “three or four children in a hotel room” for him to have sex with. He asked one woman to get him a naked picture of a newborn’s genitals. He also said he got sexual thrills from watching girls walking from school. A probation report into O’Halloran said he was “at huge risk of reoffending”. He was released from prison two weeks ago and is staying with a friend at a house in Foxrock, south Dublin, which overlooks the hockey pitch of local school Loreto College. Parents in the estate are up in arms over his return to the house in Foxrock. One resident said: “People are furious. Everybody is waiting to see what happens next. He is a paedophile and he’s a repeat offender. “Parents are having conversations with their kids now and perhaps a bit sooner than they would have.” The Sunday World confronted O’Halloran this week to ask if he still posed a threat to children. He said: “I’ll stay out of people’s way. I don’t want any trouble from people. I don’t want to interfere with people whatsoever. If people here are concerned, I regret that. “I have been through enough. It hasn’t been easy. The whole thing is tragic and I regret it very much. There is not going to be a repeat.” O’Halloran accepted that he was a repeat offender in the past, but says he now believes he poses no danger. “I have done my time. I did four-and-a-half years this time in prison. I did whatever therapeutic work was available in prison at the time. I’m trying to get on with my life now. O’Halloran said that he takes responsibility for what he did and will also take responsibility for the choices he makes in the future. “I don’t think it’s helpful to vilify me any further than what has been done in the past.” When asked if he understood why parents were concerned that he is living in the area, he said: “I understand that perfectly. All I can say is that I feel I am perfectly capable of making good decisions and good choices from here on in. “I have no desire to cause suffering to anybody else or to myself. I just hope people can accept that. Certainly I don’t want a whole aura of fear surrounding me. I have my own fears and I’m trying to deal with those myself.” He said that he was also abused as a child and feels that could have had an impact on how he turned out. “There have been things in my past life and my young life that influenced how I progressed. That is not to say in any way I condone it. I made the choices, I made the decisions in the past. I hope now I have the capacity to make better decisions in the future.” Residents expressed concern that the house O’Halloran stays in overlooks the hockey pitch of Loreto school, but he said: “I have nothing to do with the school. My room is in the back of the house. I don’t even overlook the school. He referred to recent cases involving sex offenders and said: “There have been a lot of very disturbing incidents in the recent past. I hear those and they cause concern.” O’Halloran said he did all the treatment available to him in prison. “I think it has helped considerably. People have been very, very good and tried to help. “These are people who don’t want to see the same thing happen again and don’t want me to suf fer as a result of the choices and decisions I’ve made.” O’Halloran stays at the house with his pal Willie Phelan, who gave character evidence for O’Halloran at his trial. In 2007 ACC Bank secured a summary judgment for €14.6million against Phelan and two other family members arising from loans advanced in connection with a property development in Co. Kilkenny. The judgment came after Phelan was forced to abandon the project to build a high-profile housing scheme because he did not have the resources to complete it. Phelan is originally from Kerry, but has spent a lot of time based in Kilkenny. His house was repossessed as part of the judgment, but it failed to sell and Phelan still resides there. O’Halloran was first arrested in December 2001 after meeting a prostitute in Blackhall Place. His trial was told he did not have sex with the woman, but asked her if she could get him a young girl. When asked if he meant a 15 or 16-year-old, he said: “No, someone aged seven or nine.” The horrified hooker pretended to play along, taking his mobile phone number and car registration, which she then passed on to Gardai. She also told them his first name. He was sentenced to two years in jail in 2003 for trying to obtain a child for sex and for having a sick collection of child abuse images. He was also kicked off the police force. O’Halloran was released from jail on July 4, 2004. He returned to his old ways and in October 2005 and April 2006 he asked prostitutes to source him children for sex. One of the women said O’Halloran also suggested he had abused children in foreign countries. O’Halloran’s barrister Lúan O’Braonáin denied his client ever travelled abroad for child abuse and said gardai could find no evidence of such travel. He was convicted in 2009 and received a six-year sentence. However, he received time off for good behaviour in prison. As a crime prevention officer, he regularly worked with children and even comforted a family after their daughters had been sexually abused. He has been keeping a relatively low profile since moving back into Foxrock. A local said he didn’t talk to anyone in the area the last time he was living there. “People always thought there was something strange about him. We knew he was living there before he went into prison, but didn’t know who he was. He wouldn’t make eye contact or talk to anyone.” O’Halloran said he intends to stay in the area, but he will stay out of people’s way. November 2010 Ex-garda asked prostitutes to find him children for sex The Irish State has succeeded in increasing, by 15 months, the sentence handed down to a former garda sergeant who incited a prostitute to find children for him to have sex with. Kieran O’Halloran (50), who had been a member of the gardai for 22 years and who held a command post in Croatia while working for the UN, offered two prostitutes up to 10,000 euro to source the children and asked one to organise “three or four children in a hotel room” for him to rape. O’Halloran, formerly of Whitethorn Walk, Westminister Park, Foxrock, Dublin, also showed a child pornography DVD to one prostitute and asked her to get him a picture of a newborn baby. He received a six-year sentence with 15 months suspended at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court in March last year, having pleaded guilty to inciting the women “to organise or knowingly facilitate the use of a child for the purpose of sexual exploitation” in October 2005 and April 2006. A 20-year post-release supervision order was also imposed on O’Halloran in 2003 when he was jailed for three years for an almost identical offence. The Court of Criminal Appeal yesterday replaced O’Halloran’s sentence with a six-year jail term after having found that Judge Katherine Delahunt had erred in principle when imposing the original sentence. The court was told that rehabilitation in O’Halloran’s case had not worked and that there was a societal obligation to protect the “tiny children” with whom he was fixated. Presiding judge Mr Justice Liam McKechnie said that O’Halloran’s offences indicated a depraved mind. In handing down the revised six-year sentence, he said that the court was strongly of the view that O’Halloran should receive the most appropriate treatment while in custody. The judge ordered that O’Halloran also remain subject to the provisions of the existing post-release supervision scheme until the year 2023.