A warning before you read on: this series contains reference to sexual abuse.
If you've been following the newest RTÉ Documentary On One podcast, Pirate Predator, for the last three weeks, you will be well versed in the horrors of Eamon Cooke's crimes against children.
The serial child sex abuser, who once controlled Ireland's leading pirate radio station in the 80s, managed to get the guards in his pocket, and usurp a radio station, while secretly damaging the lives of countless children in his native Inchicore.
He had acquired a level of power, money and minor celebrity that made him untouchable. Until one faithful conversation…
This week's instalment opens with the one thing nobody could have anticipated: an on-air broadcast from Cooke addressing allegations that he had molested children at Radio Dublin.
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To discover what leads to this dramatic turn in fortune for Cooke, what possessed him to take to the airwaves and what it means for the victims who narrate this series, read on or press play above for the full story.
And remember this is a live investigation, so the team wants your help. If you have any information on Cooke, send it to documentaries@rte.ie, or you can leave an anonymous tip here.
Inside Radio Dublin
To make sense of the above introduction, we have to rewind a bit to early 1978 and go inside the world of Radio Dublin at the height of pirate radio and Eamon Cooke's fame.
At this point, Cooke’s whole existence centred around the station, despite rarely taking to the airwaves himself. Instead, he had a slate of young disc jockeys running the show - literally.
Some of those former DJs, like James Dillon and former station manager DJ John Paul, gave exclusive interviews to the podcast about their time at the broadcaster and life working with Cooke.
Most DJs created on-air names to conceal their identities in case the station was raided, DJ John Paul still requests that his real name be kept anonymous.
Cooke was obsessed, John Paul said he would do anything to keep Radio Dublin on air, including climbing poles in the depths of winter, and putting his health at risk.
But it took more than a handful of 20-something DJs to keep the station ticking over - due to its popularity, Radio Dublin needed people to answer phones and take requests, and that’s where telephonists came in, which in Radio Dublin’s case were usually young and female…
Radio Dublin was growing rapidly as was Cooke’s influence, but on 17 January 1978, the gardaí would burst through the station's doors. To find out what happened next, I strongly advise you to hit play.
It is worth mentioning that Cooke’s second wife, Joan, was forced to live amongst the chaos of Radio Dublin, now running full-time from her home.
In the words of Mr Moore, her home was like "O'Connell Street" with the number of people and children coming and going through her door at all hours of the day or night.
He told the podcast that she would look fabulous one day and "in the horrors the next day" during this time.
But from what people told the podcast team, she was a kind-hearted woman stuck in a marriage with a difficult man with a dark secret.
He was definitely a control freak. Eamon controlled everything. If you gave Eamon an idea, as long as he could take that idea and say it was his, he would be happy. But if you tried to change anything, he would, react very differently
- DJ John Paul
The Children
As Cooke ran Radio Dublin from the downstairs of his Inchicore home 24/7, upstairs, he would sexually abuse vulnerable young children like Siobhan and Anne, who have allowed the podcast to hear their first-hand accounts of Cooke’s sexual violence.
In the last episode, the women explained that Cooke would often abuse children in pairs. In a particularly harrowing account in this week’s instalment, Anne describes him "carrying Siobhan and I in both arms naked into his bedroom".
It did not matter to this serial abuser that there were DJs on air or young telephonists taking calls downstairs, Cooke continued to find excuses to bring young children upstairs to a bedroom and violate them unbeknownst to his staff.
Siobhan was 11 years old when something happened: Her grandmother died, and the thought of her looking down from heaven and witnessing what was happening to Siobhan at the hands of Cooke caused something to shift for the young girl.
But everything really changed for Siobhan the day Cooke’s abuse took an even darker, perverse and truly heinous turn.
I have no words to do her story justice, so please hit play and listen to Siobhan’s courageous account of what happened to her the day she fell asleep in a bed that was not her own.
I remember feeling, my granny's looking down from heaven now and she sees, this doesn't feel right. And I wouldn't like this for my granny to be looking at me in heaven. So that was a really pivotal point for me to know I don't want this
- Siobhan, survivor
Blackmailer
Once Cooke noticed his victims like Anne and Siobhan coming of age and pushing back, he ramped up his manipulation tactics to keep the children returning to Radio Dublin.
He started to blackmail them.
Cooke took photographs of children in their underwear and threatened to put those pictures on his car and park it outside the children’s homes, so their families would see the images, all to ensure they kept coming back to his house.
He also used to record family members of his victims walking down the street on his cine camera to effectively show the children he saw everything.
On top of this the rising popularity of Radio Dublin cemented Cooke’s status in the public domain, glossing over his criminal past and making him a public figure.
He used the cine camera as a method of, to induce fear, too. He would record our family members as they walked down the street, show us them, and threaten
- Anne, survivor
The Grenade
One day Cooke took a young Siobhan and a friend of hers into a locked room with old equipment. It was here that he showed them pictures of topless women.
This conversation would eventually kickstart a mutiny at Radio Dublin…
Later something arose in the station about a bare-breasted woman and Siobhan innocently mentioned knowing where to find pictures of them.
The 13-year-old telephonist she was chatting to was taken aback and by the end of the conversation suspected that Cooke was abusing Siobhan.
Word travels fast, and someone told DJ James Dillon in a nightclub that, according to the young telephonist, Cooke was "fiddling with the children".
Despite making decent money from working with Cooke and having a job he enjoyed, Mr Dillon knew he had to investigate further, so with the help of the teenage telephonist who talked to Siobhan he hatched a plan…
To learn what happened next hit play above on episode three of Pirate Predator.
I just knew at that second, this is an adult manipulating a child. I don’t know what he did. But he didn’t go to those lengths for nothing. And from that moment, I definitely believed that he was a paedophile and that he had been interfering with the children
- James Dillon
Mass Exodus
Now there was proof Cooke was a predator out in the open, but the next question was how were the likes of Mr Dillon going to get rid of him?
The opportunity arose when Cooke went away on a holiday to Spain along with a 15-year-old Radio Dublin telephonist who had won the prize in a competition hosted by the broadcaster.
The teenager and Cooke were joined by another staff member and their partner.
While Cooke was away, Mr Dillon got to work and called a group meeting of DJs; he showed them his evidence and said this had to be the end of Radio Dublin.
Mr Dillon had also made another decision: To open a new radio station.
As mobile phones were non-existent, Cooke had no idea his station was crumbling until the day he returned to Irish soil…
Instead of panicking, Cooke went on the offensive and contacted the press to ensure a fake news story of his making was on the front page the next morning.
Finally, we are back to our opening with Cooke taking to the airwaves, where he spoke for two hours straight, twisting the truth, and recasting himself as the victim of this tale.
I’m putting my hand up and saying, I'm going. If anybody wants to come with me, it's up to you guys. It turned out that every single person that was in the room decided to leave
- James Dilllon
You can stream Pirate Predator anywhere you get podcasts, episodes drop weekly every Monday
This series features scenes of child sex abuse. If affected by any issues raised, please visit rte.ie/helplines
If you know anything about Eamon Cooke, please contact us in confidence at documentaries@rte.ie or you can leave an anonymous tip here
