A CHILD rapist will be sentenced in Dublin this week for the decade of sexual abuse he inflicted on a young girl considered to be his daughter.
Michael Smith was extradited back to Ireland last year, after being jailed in Britain in 2008 for grooming and sexually abusing a teenage girl he meet through a social media site.
This week Dublin’s Central Criminal Court heard that the 53-year-old from Tipperary managed to leave Ireland in 2004 after being interviewed by gardaí when his Irish victim informed officers of the abuse she had suffered over nearly a decade.
The woman, who has waived her right to anonymity, believed that Smith was her father at the time of the abuse, which began when he moved in with her mother.
The Dubliner, who reported the abuse when she was 17, claimed it began when she was eight and continued when Smith moved out of her family home, at addresses he held across the city.
This week Smith, previously of Maplewood Way in Tallaght, pleaded guilty to nine counts of rape, two counts of oral rape, one count of possession of child pornography and assault causing harm of Michelle Smith at addresses in Rathmines, Tallaght and Cabra on dates between 1994 and 2004.
The court heard that Smith was able to leave Ireland, after voluntarily being interviewed by gardaí in 2004, despite officers finding video footage of him abusing his victim, who was 11 at the time of the recording, during a follow-up search of his property.
He successfully moved to England, without being pursued by Irish authorities, but four years later was stopped by British police officers who found him with a 15-year-old girl he had groomed online for sex.
They also found him in possession of 19,000 images of child pornography – with 19 images in the most serious category – and he was jailed in 2008.
Upon his release in 2014 he was extradited back to Ireland.
After pleading guilty at Dublin’s Central Criminal Court this week, Mr Justice Moran remanded Smith in custody. He will be sentenced on Friday, June 19.
