Serial rapist gets five years for attack on 18-year-old

A 37-year-old man from Castlefin, County Donegal, has been sentenced to five years imprisonment by the Central Criminal Court for the rape of an 18-year-old woman at an address in Convoy on 14 January 2018. Desmond Leitch was found guilty by jury following a trial in which evidence showed the victim was heavily intoxicated when she was taken to a spare bedroom and assaulted. The court heard that Leitch has previous convictions for rape and stalking. Mr Justice David Keane imposed the sentence taking into account Leitch's diagnosis of schizophrenia and mild intellectual dysfunction, though a probation report assessed him as posing a high risk of sexual reoffending. The judge backdated the sentence to October 2024 and imposed four years of post-release supervision with the Probation Service, requiring Leitch to comply with all directions issued.