Two brothers who were allowed to return home after being declared mentally unfit to face child abuse charges have been admitted to a psychiatric unit, it was claimed tonight.
The community in the rural Co Fermanagh village of Donagh reacted furiously when James and Owen Roe McDermott - 61 and 52 respectively - returned to their house last month after being deemed unable to stand trial over a litany of abuse allegations.
Along with two of their other brothers, they faced 60 charges dating over a period of 30 years.
One of those brothers, John McDermott, was jailed for nine years, while the other, Peter Paul McDermott, died during the trial.
The two brothers declared mentally unfit returned to the family home near a play park on the Moorlough Road in the village, prompting protests from locals.
There were also calls for action by the Stormont Assembly to close the legal loophole that meant they could not be committed to an institution.
Sinn Féin MP for Fermanagh and South Tyrone Michelle Gildernew said the men had now voluntarily admitted themselves into a psychiatric unit in Derry.
‘The removal of these two abusers from the Donagh community needed to happen, it should not have been an option for them to return to this small village,’ she said.
‘The fact that these two men continued to live in Donagh, in such close proximity to various amenities for the children’ was an absolute disgrace.
‘Whilst the two men are in the hospital on a voluntary basis and at the minute, it appears that they are free to leave, it is a much better place for them to be, both for their own welfare and to allow the community time to heal.
‘The people of Donagh, and their victims in particular, have had to live under the shadow of this for decades, and it is only right that their abusers have done the decent thing and moved on.
‘We must still remember that this does not solve the problem and the same problems still exist within the mental health legislation and this still needs to be addressed.’
