507 entries for Transfers

The Minister suggested that this should not be framed as a formal request but should be suggested more informally. This action was followed, and a letter was sent by the Department to Managers of St Patrick’s in October 1944, referring to the proposed appointment: it is observed that this Sister is over 66 years old. It is considered that a person of that age would be unable to give the necessary personal attention to the duties which a Resident Manager of an Industrial School is expected to discharge. In the circumstances, it is requested that a younger member of the Community be appointed to the position as soon as possible and that the new appointment be notified to the Department.

In her inspection report dated 15th March 1945, Dr McCabe described the newly appointed Resident Manager, Sr Irma,1 as excellent. She noted a nurse had been appointed to take charge of the younger children and thought it was a step in the right direction.

They both described Sr Elvira,2 who was a school teacher, as being particularly nasty and cruel. They said that she punished children for no apparent reason and also locked them in a cupboard without food or drink until late at night. This Sister left in the mid-1940s, and one of the witnesses said that things improved following her departure.

A different account appeared in a statement prepared by the Sister in question, Sr Stella, which was taken after Dr McCabe’s investigations. She said that she observed a child in tears after coming from the School where Mr Jacobs had given her sweets. According to this account, the Sister asked the child whether anything had happened in the School, and the child said no, that she had only gone in to Mr Jacobs for sweets.

Sr Tova then took up the story. She said that, as soon as she discovered the child’s sexual history, she arranged for two Sisters to accompany her to Limerick, and wrote to the Department for sanction for that transfer, and for the transfer of an older girl to St Anne’s, Kilmacud. This precipitated Dr McCabe’s investigation and the revelations about Mr Jacobs, which she confirmed came as a great shock, as he had been working in the School for 30 years and ‘no-one had ever suspected him’.

When speaking to Sr Tova, Dr McCabe dismissed the behaviour of the other children as childish playing and did not think it merited any further action. The Sisters, however, wanted all the children concerned transferred out of St Joseph’s. A few days after Dr McCabe’s visit, one of the children was found ‘doing an immoral act in the playground before young children’, and this confirmed the Sisters in their view that all of the children involved should be transferred out of St Joseph’s.

The Mother General and the Reverend Mother informed the meeting that they were satisfied that, apart from the Jacobs affair, things were not as bad as originally thought. The matter had been brought under control by the removal of certain girls, diligence on the part of the Sisters, and the fact that, as a result of the group system, the ‘evil had not extended beyond a single group’. They also said that ‘the affair in which XX had been concerned with Mr Jacobs had occurred in the summer of 1953 and not, as had first been thought, during last summer’.

He appealed to the Department on the grounds that, although Jacobs deserved penal servitude, the court case would bring the convent into great disrepute, and the children involved would have to give evidence, and this would do them immense harm. Mr Jacobs had been dismissed immediately following Dr McCabe’s disclosure: The Reverend Mother here confirmed that she had paid Jacobs and dismissed him, on that day, but without giving him any reason ... Jacobs had, she said, received his dismissal in silence.

Sr Astrid8 was appointed to the staff of St Joseph’s one year after these events in 1955. She confirmed that she heard nothing about the circumstances that had led to so many of the children being removed and to the dismissal of an employee who had been in the School for over 30 years. She said that no protocols were in place at any time for dealing with allegations of sexual abuse by the children, and the matter was never mentioned. This was notwithstanding the clear responsibility placed on the Sisters by Dr McCabe for failing to supervise the children properly. St Anne’s, Kilmacud

In January 1995, a Garda Sergeant, stationed at Kilkenny Garda Station, began an investigation into allegations of sexual and physical abuse at St Joseph’s School in Kilkenny. In the course of his enquiries, he heard allegations of severe sexual abuse, including buggery, and of physical abuse against two men who had been employed in St Joseph’s during the 1970s. The first of these allegations involved Thomas Pleece,20 who was employed in St Joseph’s from 1972 until 1976, when he was summarily removed by the Resident Manager following complaints by boys.

Thomas Pleece admitted sexual abuse in St Joseph’s, as well as in St Augustine’s where he had worked previously, and also to abusing two boys fostered by him after he left St Joseph’s. He was indicted on 271 counts and received a 10-year sentence in October 1997.

Thomas Pleece completed the course and, on completion, was highly recommended to Sr Astrid, who appointed him with sole responsibility for 16 teenage boys. He was House Parent for Summerhill, one of the group homes in St Joseph’s. According to Sr Úna O’Neill, who gave evidence to the Committee as Superior General of the Congregation: He was the House Parent for Summerhill so he would effectively have been in charge of the house. The manager would have visited as she did fairly regularly all of the houses each day and every evening. She and all concerned thought it was a great achievement to have a man in charge of the boys. In his professional child care capacity it was assumed that he would act as a father figure and role model for them.

Thomas Pleece left St Joseph’s between September 1973 and April 1974 and went to work in Drogheda, where he was offered a job which paid slightly better than St Joseph’s. He paid one visit to Kilkenny during the time he worked in Drogheda, and became aware that the children were not happy with his replacement. Sr Astrid met him and they discussed the possibility of his coming back. He agreed, provided she could match his salary in Drogheda. He returned to Kilkenny in April 1974 and remained there until 1976.

Mr Pleece continued to work as a care worker in Summerhill until 1976.

Mr Pleece gave his own account of the circumstances of his leaving in 1976 to the Investigation Committee: Well, I was just reading Sr Astrid’s account of what happened, but her recollection is a little wrong in some respects. First of all, a problem had arisen in St Joseph’s that I didn’t know about. There had been a complaint made against me. I didn’t know this, but one morning I got a message from Sr Astrid that I wasn’t to send the children to school, that I was to the bring them over to the convent, to the parlour. There was two big rooms in the convent. Which I did, and other members of staff were there as well. There were two other members of staff. So they were all there. All the boys were all put into the one room. I wasn’t told anything of what was happening. The boys were being brought into another room one by one. I was later to learn that – because I was the last person to go in and it was Dr Black 26 that was interviewing each boy and every member of staff.