Eimear Dodd
Gardaí seized nine mobile phones during a search of the home of an Irish celebrity accused of engaging in sexual acts with a teenage girl, a court has heard.
The man (40), who cannot be named for legal reasons, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of engaging in sexual acts with a child under the age of 17 at locations in Dublin on dates between August and December 2010.
Giving evidence on Thursday, a garda witness told Eilis Brennan SC, prosecuting, that he was present during a search of the man's house on June 7th, 2021.
He said four Huawei phones and five iPhones were seized by gardaí following the search. The man provided the PIN numbers for these nine phones to gardaí.
The witness agreed with Morgan Shelley BL, defending, that it was helpful that his client supplied these PIN numbers.
An expert witness gave evidence that four of the nine phones seized during the search required specialist repairs before they could be examined by a garda technical officer. Of these four phones, data could only be extracted from three devices.
The court heard data was extracted from eight of the nine phones seized at the man's house. Mr Shelley told the court that a hard drive, containing 600GB of data that had been extracted from the phones, was disclosed to the defence in September, with additional evidence provided to the defence on Thursday morning.
A detective sergeant gave evidence that she became aware of the complainant's allegations against the man in March 2021. She said she was granted a warrant in June 2021 to search the man's property.
Mr Shelley put it to the witness that she did not inform the judge that the nature of his client's work when she applied for a search warrant. The witness said she “wouldn’t ordinarily outline someone’s profession” when applying for a search warrant and it did not have any relevance to what was being investigated.
She confirmed that she did not provide information about the man's profession to the judge at the time.
Search warrant
The detective sergeant confirmed the man was alone in his apartment when she and four other members of An Garda Síochána executed the search warrant. The witness said she informed the man of the nature of the allegation against him and cautioned him.
Another garda who was present during the search said the man told gardaí that he had some old phones and showed them their locations.
He also said the man “enquired about the allegation” and was “informed about the allegations made” by the complainant.
The witness said the man replied, “I know her.”
The court also heard that gardaí took a DNA sample from the man on May 5th, 2022, during a period of detention.
It is the State's case that the man put his penis in the complainant's mouth on three occasions, once in his workplace and twice in his home. The complainant was 16 at the time, while the man was then 27.
The alleged offences occurred on dates between August and December 2010.
Dublin Circuit Criminal Court previously heard that the complainant initially told the man she was 18. In her evidence, she said she had told him her actual age before they engaged in sexual activity.
The trial continues.
