A woman who was raped and threatened by her husband who also beat her with a hammer has told the Central Criminal Court of the devastating impact his crimes had on her and their child.
In a victim impact statement, the woman said the fact that she had shared a significant portion of her life with her attacker made the crimes so much more difficult to come to terms with.
Last month, the 42-year-old man was found guilty of raping, threatening to kill and threatening to cause serious harm to his wife in May and June 2014, as their marriage deteriorated.
The man had denied the allegations. He pleaded guilty to attacking his wife with a hammer in August 2014.
Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy will sentence the man next week.
At the sentence hearing this morning, the woman said the night she was raped and threatened with a knife would stay with her forever.
She said the rape left her with a complete sense of powerlessness and affected every piece of her.
It was only after her husband attacked her with a hammer weeks later and was taken into custody that she felt safe enough to report the rape, the woman said.
"I felt so broken and for a long time angry with myself for what I saw as 'letting it happen'," she said, adding that the terror she felt the night of the rape instilled a level of fear she never knew she could feel.
She said deciding to report the rape took five months because it meant admitting to herself what had happened.
"Knowing I was safe because he was in custody, the support of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre and critically because of the support provided by the investigating guard since the (subsequent) assault on August 7th my trust and confidence in how it would be dealt with and in the criminal process had grown. Yet I still found the word rape hard to use in relation to me."
She went on to describe her terror at her husband's "absolute determination" to kill her when he attacked her and her mother with a hammer a few months after the rape.
"His cold determination a focus was so clear when he kept hitting me with the hammer even when other people came. I remember trying to pull him away from my mama and seeing blood all down her face. My memory of being repeatedly hit on the ground with people all around me still leaves me with a feeling of terror.
"The level of violence shown to me and my mam on that day completely changed my outlook on life. It broke a whole sense of security surrounding my life that I never knew was even there.
"I will never forget before I went unconscious, looking down at the door of the room where (my son) slept and thinking whatever happens don't come out, don't see this, I believed in that moment I was going to die."
The woman said the psychological impact cannot be erased and she had lost trust and belief in her self, her judgement and her ability to make decisions. She said she was constantly asking herself how did she not see it coming.
"While everything in my head rationally knows that I have absolutely no responsibility for each and every one of these crimes it is a very different thing to feel it and believe it," she said.
She said the lengthy trial process intensified the constant reliving of the rape and the assault as she felt she had to keep going back over events. She still has a deep level of fear about what will happen when her husband gets out of prison.
She said the events had affected their son who had constant nightmares for a time afterwards.
"How does a child grow up and cope with knowing his father harmed his mother so badly to use a knife and hammer and to rape her...no child should have to come to terms with these horrendous circumstances."
The woman said the events had changed her for a while but and had changed her perspective of life, particularly around safety and security.
"However this experience and these events don't define me, the inner strength and courage that I found which kept me alive during some of those horrendous events and sustained me up to and during this trial gives me and my son a strong foundation for living very positive happy lives."
The trial last month heard that on the night of 25 May 2014, there was a row as she wanted to separate.
She said her husband threatened to cut her face open with a kitchen knife and ordered her upstairs where he raped her.
She said he threatened to kill her in a phone call the next day and appeared behind her as she went into a supermarket a number of days later and told her the next time he came he would have a hammer.
He is the third man to be convicted of raping his wife since a "marital exemption" in relation to rape was abolished in 1990.
Today the court heard details of the hammer attack in August 2014.
The court was told the man called to the woman's mother's house and said he had a present for their son.
He then took out a paper bag and produced a hammer and hit her on the head. Both she and her mother tried to stop him getting in but he hit both women with the hammer. A passer-by set his dog on him and he swung the hammer at the man and his dog before he eventually left.
Both women were treated in hospital.
The wife suffered bruising to back, shoulder and leg and cuts to her head. She still has scarring at her hairline.
In a victim impact statement the mother said the family would never be the same again and she did not feel safe in her own home.
She said she felt nervous answering the door and was afraid to go out alone. She said she will always remember trying to close the door on her son-in-law.
She said she the assault had caused her real anxiety because she had previously suffered a bleed on the brain and he knew about this.
His defence counsel read a letter to the court in which the man apologised for the hammer attack on his wife and said his behaviour was inexcusable and out of character.
He said it was in the context of his marriage breaking down and him being denied access to their child. The man did not apologise or refer to the other offences which he had denied during the trial.
He said he did not wish to justify his inexcusable behaviour in the hammer attack but only wished to provide a brief insight into what was going on.
He said towards the end of 2013 he was made redundant and this had a significantly negative effect on his family which was compounded by his wife's wish for a separation and divorce.
He said being denied access to his son and the efforts he made to calm the situation being rejected added to his feelings of alienation and emasculation.
"What I did was utterly reckless and unforgivable and I am sincerely and profoundly sorry," he said. He also spoke of suffering years of psychological torment.
Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy said she wanted to be clear that the man was only referring to the hammer attack in his letter. His defence counsel Padraig Dwyer confirmed he was only referring to the charges to which he had pleaded guilty and not the rape or threat which he had denied during the trial.
Mr Dwyer said a psychological report had deemed the man at low risk of re-offending.
He asked that some portion of the sentence be suspended. Mr Dwyer said that on a human level there was only one victim in the case but the man was also suffering punishments albeit self inflicted.
He said had lost the company of his son and his wider family who lived abroad and had brought humiliation and shame on himself.
His family had previously seen him as a hard working, proud man who loved his wife and child.
