62 entries for Mr John Brander

Mr Brander retired in the mid-1980s. He was subsequently convicted of abusing a boy to whom he was giving grinds. The publicity following this conviction led a former pupil of Walsh Island NS to come forward and make a statement to the Gardaí, which resulted in a full-scale investigation into Mr Brander’s period of service there.

Around the time of his third trial, Mr Brander wrote to the Christian Brothers saying that he himself had been a victim of sexual interference during his time in the Christian Brothers after he joined the Congregation in the 1930s. He described several occasions over a period of 10 years during his education and training in the Brothers when he was sexually abused by a number of named persons. The latest of the incidents happened in the 1940s. One of the offenders he named was a Brother who was expelled from the Congregation because of sexual abuse. In the letter Mr Brander said: I was very innocent when joining, and I look upon those incidents as having a profound influence on my teaching years.