A member of Sinn Fein has been suspended from the party over allegations of child abuse.
The Sunday Tribune newspaper carried a report from a woman who claimed she was abused when she was 10 years old.
Sinn Fein confirmed that a member had been suspended without prejudice from party membership and activities.
The Tribune also featured an interview with another woman who claimed she had been repeatedly raped by a prominent IRA man in west Belfast.
The Tribune story is here. Gerry Adams is in deep trouble if these allegations are true:
Both women said that Gerry Adams was aware of the details of their abuse but had failed to take action. Cahill, who didn’t want her first name printed, is a former Ógra Sinn Féin national secretary.
Cahill (28) revealed how the IRA had brought her face-to-face in 2000 with the man who had previously raped her, saying they wanted “to read the body language” to see who was telling the truth. “I felt physically sick,” she stated. She said she was never advised to report the rapes to the police or social services.
“I wanted to go to the Rape Crisis Centre. I said I needed professional help. The IRA offered me a counsellor. I said that would be a charade because it would be an IRA-friendly counsellor.”
She said ‘M’, her rapist, was put under IRA house arrest in Belfast after it was learned he’d also sexually abused two of her cousins. However, she was later told he ‘escaped’. “I didn’t accept that. I believe the IRA facilitated his move to Donegal,” she said.
She described many heated meetings with the IRA and with Sinn Féin president, Gerry Adams.
At one meeting with the IRA attended by Padraig Wilson, the IRA’s go-between with the international decommissioning body, Cahill asked that her rapist be brought back from Donegal.
“Padraig said: ‘Do you think we should be running around after you?’ I started crying. I said it wasn’t just about me. ‘M’ shouldn’t have been allowed to go somewhere else he’d have access to kids.”
She eventually ended a series of meetings with Adams feeling they were “pointless”. According to Cahill, at the first meeting: “Gerry said he knew of the horror of abuse but he believed people could recover and continue with their lives. He said sex abuse cases were very hard to prove as it was one person’s word against another.
Far more at Slugger O’Toole. Hat-tip to More Media Nonsense.
UPDATE: Individuals named.
