OUR Reporter on How Paedo Priest Gained Her Family's Trust
By Niamh O'Connor
I went to court this week to tell a priest I had known and trusted that he was the last person I expected to see there on paedophile charges. I just wanted to look Fr Denis Nolan in the eye. I also asked him if it was true, though he had already pleaded guilty to all charges. “I’ll tell you sometime over a cup of tea,” he said, lying through his teeth. Again. Brave teenager John Paul Hunter was the sex victim of predator Nolan from the ago of 12. Now 19, John Paul waived his right to anonymity to name and shame the parish priest, from the small town of Rathnew in Co. Wicklow, who was jailed for seven years for repeatedly sexually abusing him. Wiping away tears, John Paul told me after the hearing: “I’m just so happy it’s over. He ruined my life. “Words can’t express how hard it has been, but I want to start building my future now.” I had known and trusted Fr Nolan. I stopped going to Mass on Sundays in my teens because it was boring. By my mid-twenties too many paedophile priests had been outed to want to go back. But I still wanted the Roman Catholic rituals for the big life events – marriage, Christenings, funerals. And there was someone I trusted for all of that... When Fr Denis Nolan moved to our parish in Sandyford in Dublin, he brought a breath of fresh air. He was as sickened as everyone else at the extent of the child abuse in the Catholic Church, the cover-ups, and the cold and clinical lack of remorse. “It’s very difficult knowing I devoted my life to an organisation that protected paedophiles,” he often used to say. “I know people look at me and think, ‘is he one?’ That’s the legacy for the ordinary priest like me.” He didn’t want to be seen as someone on a pedestal. You could ask him about Bishop Brendan Casey’s affair with Annie Murphy, or the story with Fr Michael Cleary and his housekeeper Phyllis Hamilton. He’d talk about how Fr Brendan Smith got away with so much for so long, and what Fr Michael Fortune was really like (“evil”). He had the inside track on Bishop Brendan Comiskey, and Fr Michael Ledwith, and he shone a light on the closed, and insular world of the Church. Inevitably, his opinion would always mirror your own – that it was impossible to stomach the hypocrisy, and the hurt caused. Sometimes, if he’d had a drink, other things would slip, too. I remember him talking about his shock on becoming a seminarian in Maynooth to discover the corridors were with “hopping” with gay sex. He said it was like a big orgy, but that he’d just stayed well out of it. I trusted him, believed him as one of the good guys. He convinced me that children were abused in the Church of the past, but that the new generation of priests was different. His avatar was Denis the Menace on Facebook – I thought of him as one of us. I realise now that if you have a secret as dark as he had, your whole life would have to be constructed around duping families into trusting you, because if you’re isolated, and treated like a weirdo, you’re never going to get near their children. “You can’t pick them out in a crowd,” Theresa Stafford, the mother of Nolan’s victim, John Paul Hunter said. Nolan was in his late fifties when he started abusing John Paul Hunter, and took a sudden sexual interest in children. But it’s thanks to that young man’s bravery that his abuser could be named and shamed. Nolan (61), the former parish priest of Rathnew with an address in Tinahely, was led away in handcuffs after Judge Michael O’Shea praised the victim’s courage at Wicklow Circuit Court. “He has ruined my life,” John Paul said. “But I want to close this chapter and move on. What I would say to anyone out there suffering is tell someone straight away.” The priest’s “systematic” abuse of the child was described as “disgusting, horrific, embarrassing and humiliating” by the judge. As a teenager, John Paul has tried on three occasions to commit suicide and been admitted to Tallaght Hospital with suicidal ideation as a result of the horrors he suffered as a child. He was also taken into care at the age of 14, after “going off the rails” because of the secret nightmare he was living. In his victim impact statement, young dance teacher John Paul revealed he was gay, but that he didn’t know if this was as a result of what had happened to him. “What happened went on for years and caused a lot of confusion,” he said. “It affected my ability to form relationships and I ended up in care.” Theresa Stafford sobbed in court before telling the Sunday World she was also hearing the sordid details of what had happened for the first time. “It’s turned our family upside down and we’re all struggling to cope in our own way with what he did.” Theresa said their nightmare was made worse because “only a handful believed us”. One of those people she and the victim paid tribute to was Detective Sergeant Fergus O’Brien, who investigated the case. “It’s a harrowing case, and it was a very difficult investigation,” O’Brien said. “It was very emotional for everyone involved in court.” Nolan was ordained in Dublin in 1979 and served as a priest in Sheriff Street and Sandyford – before moving to Rathnew where he was parish priest for 14 years. In May 2012 John Paul confided in his mother what the priest had done to him. “John Paul Hunter was 12 back in 2007 and he asked the parish priest of Rathnew if he had any jobs he could do,” the judge said. “The accused gave him work around the garden across the road from the school. He would go over after school and pull weeds and do general gardening. He was paid between ˆ10 and ˆ15 initially.” Three weeks later the priest drove him to a house he owned in Tinahely, and after John Paul had worked in his garden, he grabbed him by the privates. The boy moved away, and became quiet, but the priest assured him this was “what adults do” and gave him ˆ10. The next time John Paul worked in his the garden, Fr Nolan started feeling his leg and kissing him. The priest asked him if he had told anybody about what happened in Tinahely and when the child said ‘no’, the priest asked the child if he enjoyed it. This time he paid him ˆ15. “Then it took a more sinister turn,” the judge said. “In the presbytery in Rathnew the accused put his hands on the child’s penis and made John Paul do the same. He took off his clothes and the accused put his penis into John Paul’s mouth. This occurred on numerous occasions. After each incident the accused gave him money and the amounts increased.” John Paul’s mother became suspicious because of the amount of money the child had and the frequency with which he went to the priest’s house. The money went from ˆ15 to ˆ40. She confronted Fr Nolan on his doorstep and inquired why he was giving her son so much money. “I’ll never forget the look on his face,” Theresa said. John Paul’s behaviour went out of control. He was spending the money on drink, and he ended up in care. Theresa contacted the HSE warning them not to let the priest near the home of her son while he was in Bray. Despite assuring the HSE that he would not have any contact with John Paul, Fr Nolan continued to collect the vulnerable child in his car from the care home, and to abuse him and to pay him. John Paul was told to lie down in the back of the car so he wouldn’t be seen by anyone, and again and again was made to perform sex acts, for which he was given money. In his victim impact statement, John Paul said he’d lost out on his childhood, which was spent trying to please his abuser. Nolan pleaded guilty to 20 charges – including three counts of sexual assault of John Paul at the presbytery in Rathnew and at his house in Tinahely, when the victim was 12 years old. When asked if he believed his actions might have caused John Paul to attempt suicide, he said: “I suppose it could be a contributory factor.” The priest’s lawyer said Fr Nolan was deeply ashamed of what he had done, but that his family, although reviled by his actions, were standing by him.
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