“My focus is on the victim”, says Independent Ireland TD Ken O’Flynn, after Deputy Ruth Coppinger accused him of “using gender based violence to be racist.”
Last week in the Dáil, People Before Profit TD Ruth Coppinger accused Independent TD for Cork North-Central, Ken O’Flynn, of “using gender based violence to be racist.”
The comments came as Deputy O’Flynn was calling on the government to examine the judicial practice of taking into consideration when passing a sentence that an offender is a foreign national, and as such is expected to have a more difficult time in prison in Ireland due to issues such as language barriers and the likely lack of visits from family and friends.
This argument is often used in mitigation in criminal cases, including serious crimes.
Deputy Coppinger accused O’Flynn of “using gender based violence to be racist,” as well as claiming, “You never care when it’s an Irish man.”
Coppinger added, “You only care” if the accused is “foreign” and, “You don’t care about women, stop pretending.”
Deputy O’Flynn rejected these claims, telling Gript, “When a vulnerable woman is the victim of sexual violence, the debate should focus on justice for her, not on trying to shut down legitimate questions about sentencing policy.”
“My focus is on the victim,” he said.
His comments were made in reference to a case where an Afghan man, Akbar Moqadar (36) of Greenwood Estate, Togher, Co Cork, and Glenworth Street, Limerick, was convicted of orally raping a woman with intellectual disabilities at a sauna in Cork.
“A vulnerable woman with an intellectual disability was sexually assaulted. The offender was convicted. During sentencing, the court noted the “difficulties for a foreign national serving a sentence in this jurisdiction”, and this was taken into account, he said.
“I raised a straightforward question in the Dáil. Should the nationality of an offender ever be considered in a way which reduces the sentence for a serious sexual crime?”
“That is a legitimate question about sentencing policy. It has nothing to do with racism,” he said.
Moaqadar targeted the “very vulnerable” woman at the steam room of a swimming pool before he exposed his penis and demanded that she perform oral sex on him.
When the woman refused, he pushed her head towards his penis and orally raped her; he also prevented her from leaving the area.
Deputy O’Flynn said, “Victims of sexual violence deserve to know the justice system places them first. Justice must be blind to nationality.”
“If asking whether victims should come first is now considered controversial by some politicians, that says more about their priorities than it does about mine,” he concluded.