Shamed ex-boxer who sexually abused boy (14) in park jailed for 32 months

One of Ciaran McAuley’s victims came forward as a result of a story in the Belfast Telegraph newspaper about the dangerous paedophile, Newry Crown Court was told.

Judge Peter Irvine KC jailed McAuley for 32 months and told him he was such a danger to the public, and especially to teenage boys, that he was imposing an extended jail sentence.

He described the 35-year-old as a “persistent and predatory sex offender”.

The extended sentence means McAuley’s release will be a matter for the parole commissioners and when he is eventually released, he will be subject to supervised licence conditions for an extra three years.

McAuley, originally from Belfast and who boxed for Northern Ireland at the Commonwealth Games, had earlier entered guilty pleas to meeting a child following sexual grooming.

He also admitted two charges of sexual activity with a child and one of attempting to meet a second boy following sexual grooming, all committed between August 2011 and January 2012.

In an agreed statement of facts, prosecuting counsel David McNeill said that as a result of a story in the Belfast Telegraph the first victim came forward in February 2021 to report that he recognised the defendant as the man who had sexually assaulted him 10 years earlier when he was just 14-years-old.

McAuley had contacted the boy through social media “out of the blue” and asked the schoolboy to meet him at the Waterworks in north Belfast on December 9, 2011, paying the boy “some kind of compliment”.

“The defendant told the victim he was 17 or 18, but he could see that he was older,” said Mr McNeill.

He added that the boy was “scared because the defendant was older and bigger than him”.

Although initially planned for December 9, the pair met earlier on December 8 and the 14-year-old agreed to have sex with McAuley behind bushes at the Waterworks.

When it was over, “there were people walking past the bush so the defendant waited for a while and then beckoned the victim to say it was safe to come out,” he told the court.

That incident related to the first three charges listed but the court heard that the victim disclosed the incident to one of his friends and that McAuley also tried to make arrangements to meet that boy as well.

“The defendant started by asking him questions about his sexuality and whether he was attracted by men, then wanted to meet him at the Waterworks,” said Mr McNeill.

There was an arrangement made but instead of going, the boy went home after school, but McAuley sent him messages asking where he was.

That boy saw the same Belfast Telegraph report and recognised McAuley who was questioned by police in prison but who refused to answer questions.

Mr McNeill revealed that McAuley “has been convicted of nine sex offences and four breaches of a Sexual Offences Prevention Order”.

McAuley was first jailed for two years in December 2015 after carrying out a sex attack on a nine-year-old boy in the New Lodge area of Belfast as he was walking home from a funfair, chasing the boy down an alley and abusing him.

During his sentencing remarks today, Judge Irvine revealed that on the day he got out of prison from that sentence, McAuley grabbed a 14-year-old boy and dragged him down an alleyway, “holding a knife to his throat while he carried out a number of sex acts on him".

McAuley declared from the dock that “I didn’t have a knife” but Judge Irvine sternly told him “be quiet and sit down now”.

The judge said it was clear from the various reports that McAuley is a persistent and predatory sex offender who has “expressed no remorse for his actions”.

He said the ex-boxer was assessed as having a high likelihood re-offending and he clearly poses a significant risk of causing serious harm, especially to boys aged 9 to 16 years.

In addition to the extended jail sentence, Judge Irvine also ordered McAuley to sign the police sex offenders register for the rest of his life and made him the subject of a lifelong SOPO.