DISGRACED FORMER priest Oliver O’Grady has been arrested in the Algarve.
The 74-year-old represents one of Ireland’s biggest known sex offenders.
O’Grady was first jailed for 14 years in the early 1990s after admitting to the abuse of two young brothers.
He was paroled after seven years and deported back to Ireland in 2000.
In a filmed deposition recorded in 2005, O’Grady confessed to the rape, molestation and abuse of at least 25 children in California from 1973 onwards.
His crimes were later chronicled in the documentary Deliver Us From Evil.
The film saw O’Grady detail how he preyed on children and how Church officials allegedly knew of his abuses and protected him by moving him from parish to parish.
O’Grady was later jailed for three years in January 2012 after large amounts of child pornography was discovered on a laptop, external hard drive and USB pen he left on an Aer Lingus flight.
The ex-priest has now been arrested on the Algarve after a European Arrest Warrant was issued against his name.
Sources suggest the warrant came as a direct result of a tip-off from an organisation dealing with child abuse.
A statement from the Portuguese authorities reads:
“The Policia Judiciaria, through its Criminal Investigation Information Unit, carried out an operation on October 21 in the Algarve area, to execute European Arrest Warrants against two people, an Irish national and a French-Portuguese national, aged between 46 and 74.
“The Irish national was wanted by the Irish authorities on suspicion of a crime of child pornography.
“This individual, who has already done prison time for similar crimes in the United States, returned to his homeland where he alleged committed a new crime.
“He moved afterwards to Portugal and the Algarve area where he has now been located and arrested.
“He has been remanded in prison after a court appearance pending his hand-over to the Irish authorities.”
