2021 Munster abuse case

The 2021 Munster abuse case, contemporaneously reported in the media as the Munster abuse trial, refers to a criminal trial that took place in Ireland between 2021 and 2022, pertaining to five adults who were found guilty of a plethora of offenses committed against five of the children of two of the accused, between 18 August 2014 and 28 April 2016, in several different counties in the province of Munster, Ireland.

On 6 August 2021, five out of seven accused—all of whom are from Munster—were found guilty of raping, sexually abusing, sexually exploiting, abusing, and wilfully neglecting five children: four boys and one girl. In total, the five were found guilty on 77 counts, including 18 counts of rape and 24 counts of sexual assault, all of which took place between 2014 and 2016. They were sentenced to a cumulative 57 years in prison. At the time of being removed from their parents' care in 2016, the boys were aged nine, six, four, and three, and the girl was aged seven.^[1]

The parents of the children both have intellectual impairments, with the mother's deficit reported as being more severe. The condition of the house the family lived in amounted to squalor, and both of the parents, as well as the children, were repeatedly noted for being extremely dirty.

The seven who were accused are all relatives of the five children, and cannot be named due to Irish law surrounding the identification of minors involved in criminal proceedings. Extensive reporting restrictions have been enacted around the case, and as a result, the exact detail of the abuse the children suffered cannot be reported on in order to protect the welfare of the children.