10,992 entries for Inspections - State

A number of former residents gave evidence about Br Lafayette.

One complainant stated that he ‘would have been great in the Nazis. He was the coldest, coldhearted person I ever came across ... He was cruel beyond belief’.

By way of an example, he explained that he had a job of bringing dinner to sick boys. One boy had refused his food and it was returned uneaten to Br Lafayette in the kitchen. When handing over the dinner to Br Lafayette, he told him that the boy ‘wouldn’t be having any dinner’. Later, the Brother called him out of his class and had him repeat what he said about the boy. After tea, Br Lafayette called him aside again, this time put him against the wall and asking him to repeat what he had said earlier. Once again, he repeated that the boy ‘won’t be having any dinner’. Br Lafayette then produced the leather and gave him six hard slaps on the hands. Again, Br Lafayette asked him to repeat the message, and he was given six more hard slaps with the leather.

This cycle continued until, after about 30 slaps, Br Lafayette said to him ‘You left him [the boy] having a fit on the floor, didn’t you?’, to which the boy responded ‘yes’. He was now willing to say ‘anything to stop him from hitting me’. Br Lafayette then ‘fisted’ him in the face. He was left pumping blood, and Br Lafayette told him that that would ‘teach you to tell me lies’. The witness said he still had no idea why he was being punished in this way, but could only presume that the sick boy must have had a fit after he left him. He did not make a complaint about his treatment because, if you complained, you would get into ‘deeper trouble’.

This same former resident told the Investigation Committee that, apart from Br Lafayette and two other Brothers,15 ‘it was a lovely school’. He felt the rest of the Brothers did the best with what they had.

He also stated that Br Lafayette regularly interrogated him and other boys about sex and matters relating to it in his back room. In particular, he was asked to name other boys who were involved in sexual activity: The first time it came on, he asked me, I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. And of course I got six of the best for basically telling lies.

After being punished for not being able to answer, he gave another boy’s name: I can still think of that man to this day, because I put him through the same trouble that I was in. And someone else probably put me in the same trouble because of what was going on.

Another former resident said that, because he was working in the kitchen and was under Br Lafayette’s care, he was protected from beatings from other Brothers. On one occasion, Br Lafayette intervened to stop a severe beating from Br Bevis. He said that Br Lafayette went ‘out of his way to ensure that nobody else laid a finger on me’. While Br Lafayette was in Tralee, ‘nobody really beat me up or anything at all like that. But after he left then there were threats coming in from all sides’. He added that Br Lafayette had the reputation for being the ‘hardest Brother’ in the school. ‘If he said “Jump”, you said “How high?”.’

Br Lafayette had spent two periods in Letterfrack in the 1940s and 1950s and also served in Artane. He transferred from Tralee to Glin in the 1960s.

In the late 1950s, Robert Moore, a pupil in the Industrial School, died in Tralee County Hospital. His death certificate recorded that he died from ‘Bilateral Pleural Effusion. Senility. Certified’.17 He was 16 years of age at the time.

He had been transferred from St Philomena’s in Stillorgan when he was seven, and had spent the next 10 years in Tralee. He was due for discharge some 10 months prior to his death, but had stayed on until a suitable placement was found for him as an apprentice shoemaker.

There has been considerable controversy and media speculation about the circumstances surrounding his death, and the Investigation Committee heard evidence from a number of witnesses who were in the School at the time and recalled his death.

This controversy first began to emerge in 1995, when former pupils made allegations in the media that Robert Moore had received a severe beating from Br Lafayette in the refectory for refusing to eat his food, and that he had died some days later in hospital.

Br Bevis, who served as a teacher in Tralee for almost 10 years from the mid-1950s, told the Investigation Committee that one morning he was waking the boys when he noticed that Robert Moore had been sick during the night and that his vomit was blood stained. He summoned help from another Brother who used to look after the boys. The next time Br Bevis saw the boy was when he visited him in hospital. He recalled that it must have been on a Saturday as this was the only day he could go. He took the boy a copy of The Kerryman newspaper. He remembered that Robert Moore clung to his hand and, with hindsight, he realised that Robert appeared to have some sense that he was going to die. Br Bevis tried to console him by telling him he was not as ill as others in the hospital, as he did not realise at the time that the boy was near death. Robert Moore died on a Sunday and, although Br Bevis thought it was some days after his visit, it is more likely that he died the next day.

Br Bevis was asked whether he knew why the boy had gone into hospital, and he recalled that he did have a boil on his neck at that time. He later thought he had leukaemia, and only found out in more recent times that the cause of death was recorded as septicaemia.