John Merrick of Portmarnock pleaded guilty to seven charges of indecent assault against primary school pupils in 1977 and 1978A former Christian Brother has been jailed for a year for the abuse of two pupils in a Dublin school almost 47 years ago.
Merrick, who entered the Christian Brothers order at the age of 14, subsequently left the order in 1981 after meeting his now wife. He has two children and a number of grandchildren.Sinéad Hussey: ‘We treat miscarriages as a blip or something that’s easily forgotten’‘You’re not Irish. You’re not one of us’: Northern students on a year in the South
He said he cannot bear for anyone to touch him and doesn’t know if this would have been the case, had Merrick not touched him inappropriately as a child. She acknowledged that the law which existed at the time of the offending meant that the maximum penalty available to the court is two years.