‘We were tortured’: ex-soldier on Army Apprentice School

The Defence Forces Tribunal could lead to a Garda investigation into historic child abuse, it has emerged.

A former soldier has told a tribunal that he “walked into hell” when he joined the Army Apprentice School in Devoy Barracks, Naas in Co Kildare, almost 40 years ago due to the level of verbal, mental and physical abuse he suffered.

Former apprentice, Denis Kennedy, outlined to the Defence Forces Tribunal a catalogue of alleged abuse which he suffered at the hands of his platoon commander, an officer identified only as 2LTB for legal reasons.

The tribunal is examining how the Defence Forces handled complaints of abuse between 1983 and 2024.

Mr Kennedy, who comes from Templemore in Co Tipperary, pointed out how half of his platoon were just 16 years old when he joined the Defence Forces in 1989.

“We weren’t trained. We were tortured,” said Mr Kennedy.

“We weren’t men. We were kids,” he added.

As his brother had joined the Defence Forces five years earlier, Mr Kennedy said he expected to get good training in what would be “tough but fair” conditions.

“It was not the case. I walked into hell,” he observed.

Asked about the death of another apprentice, Oliver Mullaney, by suicide in Devoy Barracks in June 1991 two days after he was subjected to verbal abuse and mockery by one or more senior officers, Mr Kennedy said it still affected him to the present day.

“It was just devastating,” he said.

Mr Kennedy claimed apprentices were told by a senior officer not to mention Mr Mullaney had died by suicide because it would impact the ability of his family to claim insurance.

The apprentice’s death at the time was reported as accidental.

‘Like a penal colony’

Another former soldier, Brian Abernethy, said the toxic conditions in the Army Apprentice School were “an excuse for a narcissistic thug to do what he wanted”.

Mr Abernethy said apprentices were treated “as if we had shot somebody”.

The safety manager, who comes originally from Kilworth in Co Cork, said the atmosphere in Devoy Barracks was in “a constant state of flux”.

He acknowledged he had brought some punishments on himself but said that once anyone got in trouble that “you’re absolutely a target”.

The tribunal heard how he estimated he had spent six months of his three years in Naas being confined to the barracks.

Mr Abernethy said recruits were treated like second-class citizens and “it felt more like a penal colony than it did a training facility”.

The witness said he was an emotional wreck after discovering 2Lt B, who was just a few years older, had ordered other members of his platoon to “sort me out”.

Mr Abernethy said he was worried he would be grabbed in the middle of the night, although he now knew that his colleagues were never going to attack him.

Read full article on the RTE news website below.

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2026/0625/1580353-defence-forces-tribunal/

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Tribunal may trigger Garda probe into historic child abuse claims

The Defence Forces Tribunal could lead to a Garda investigation into historic child abuse, it has emerged.

Denis “Max” Kennedy, on their way in to give evidence at the Defence Forces Tribunal. Picture: Neil Michael.

The tribunal heard that Tusla, the child and family agency, has recommended that assaults and abuse allegedly carried out by officers should be reported to gardaí.

Ms Justice Ann Power, the sole member of the tribunal, was told by Denis Kennedy they had been instructed to inform gardaí about what had happened, as it was considered “child abuse”.

Mr Kennedy, who joined aged 16 in September 1989, said he had been encouraged to contact a therapist to discuss the alleged abuse he endured at Devoy Barracks in the 1980s and 1990s.

After he gave his evidence on Thursday, he was asked whether he had ever considered making a formal complaint about his treatment.

He said his therapist had gone to Tusla, which informed her that his experience constituted “historic child abuse”.

Mr Kennedy told the judge: “She recommended it be reported to gardaí.”

After giving evidence, he told the Irish Examiner: “I am going to wait to get the tribunal out of the way.

“This is all very new and as this is what has been recommended, this is what I am now considering doing.

“But I am unlikely to be the only one.”

There were 13 16-year-olds in the 54th Platoon, 22 17-year-olds, and 20 recruits aged 18.

Read full article by Neil Michael at the Irish Examiner website below.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41868969.html

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‘I walked into hell’: Recruit tells Defence Forces Tribunal of being ‘tortured, not trained’

Recruits to the Defence Forces’ Apprentice School in the 1980s and 1990s were “tortured, not trained”, the Defence Forces Tribunal has been told.

Recalling the day he joined the 54th Platoon at Devoy Barracks in Naas, Co Kildare, in September 1989 at the age of 16, Denis Kennedy said: “I walked into hell.”

He told the tribunal he witnessed a senior officer — known as 2Lt B and who cannot be named for legal reasons — assaulting him and other recruits, including kicking a fellow recruit in the ribs as he did press-ups.

He also said he saw the officer order another recruit to eat cigarettes from “the dregs of an ashtray”.

One of Mr Kennedy’s closest friends, Oliver Mullaney, died by suicide on June 22, 1991, two days after allegedly being repeatedly humiliated by 2Lt B.

Previous witnesses to the tribunal have said 2Lt B ordered Mr Mullaney to not only dance on a chair but also kiss another recruit.

Mr Kennedy said the abuse was widely known about, telling tribunal senior counsel Michael Cush that more senior officers above 2Lt B would have been aware.

“They would have been well aware,” he said.

“They were watching, they were well aware.”

Asked about the most senior rank to have known, he said it was the “commanding officer” — meaning at least a lieutenant colonel.

The tribunal later heard that the unnamed commanding officer has denied being aware of the abuse suffered by Mr Mullaney.

Read full article by Neil Michael at the Irish Examiner website below.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41868969.html

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Defence Forces Tribunal hears about officer’s ‘out-of-the-world, excessive’ abuse of recruits

An army officer alleged to have forced one recruit to eat “smoking” cigarette butts also allegedly had cigarettes forced into the ears and nostrils of another recruit, the Defence Forces Tribunal has heard.

Gerard Guinan, General Secretary of PDFORRA, recalled an alleged incident by an officer who forced one recruit to eat ‘smoking’ cigarette butts also allegedly had cigarettes forced into the ears and nostrils of another recruit. File photo: Paul Mealey

Recruits were allegedly encouraged by the officer to laugh and photograph the incidents.

Tribunal witness Gerard Guinan, who enlisted in 1989 and joined the 34th Platoon at the Apprentice School in Devoy Barracks, recalled: “He was encouraging people to laugh and jeer. Looking back, it was Lord of the Flies.

“You were just happy it wasn’t you being laughed at.”

Mr Guinan, who is now the general security of the representative body PDFORRA, referenced this among a number of “out-of-the-world, excessive” abuse of recruits by an officer, who can only be referenced as 2Lt B.

There were so many incidents that recruits, who Mr Guinan referred to as “child soldiers” because most were aged between 16 and 18, couldn’t wait to get home at weekends.

Once, when a rumour swept through the platoon that weekend leave was to be withdrawn because one recruit had failed to “keep up on a run”, recruits ran for the front gate before it could be confirmed officially.

”We all ran for the gate, but when we got to the gate, they closed the gate,” Mr Guinan recalled.

He recalled an incident that emerged in an earlier tribunal hearing which saw recruit Padraic Lenaghan being allegedly ordered to eat cigarette buts. This was after the officer 2Lt B caught recruits smoking in their dormitory.

Mr Guinan recalled how some of the cigarettes had been half-stubbed out seconds before the officer found them in an ashtray under Mr Lenaghan’s bed and were still smoking.

Mr Guinan recalled: “2Lt B told him to take out the ashtray, which had cigarettes still smoking.

”He told him ‘take a butt out, put it in your mouth, chew it and swallow it’.

He then told him to open his mouth and he then told him to take out two more cigarettes and to swallow them.

Mr Guinan also recalled fellow apprentice Oliver Mullaney being subjected to “a lot of petty bullshit” and “really personalised abuse” two days before he killed himself.

Read full article by Neil Michael at the Irish Examiner website below.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41867724.html

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Defence Forces colonel denies apprentices were ‘terrified’ at training school

A senior officer has told the Defence Forces tribunal that he was surprised to hear apprentices would have been too “terrified” to complain about conditions in the apprentice school.

Generic Stock Defence Forces, action, training, soldiers, Air Corps (UJuly 2020)

The Defence Forces Apprentice School was like a “family”, Colonel Fred O’Donovan told Friday’s hearing.

The veteran of missions in Lebanon, Afghanistan, Chad, Kosovo and Brussels was responding to questions from the tribunal judge Ms Justice Ann Power.

“It depends on the context but I would be surprised if it happened in my time,” Mr O’Donovan said of the school, which closed in 1998. “Not everyone is perfect but we do do our best.”

Earlier, Ms Power had also questioned Mr O’Donovan — who trained recruits at the school between 1995 and 1998 — about his statement that apprentices could “confront the person causing harm” to them.

On a previous day, it had emerged that a teenage Defence Forces apprentice’s death in 1991 at Devoy Barracks in Co Kildare was regarded as suicide within his platoon. As well as investigating his death, the Defence Forces had also investigated a complaint Oliver Mullaney had been mistreated by a superior officer just days before he died.

The bombshell revelation by Colonel Damien Coakley was the first time it had ever been made public that there were two Defence Forces investigations into Mr Mullaney’s death, and that it could have been caused by anything other than an accident.

Ms Justice Power had asked Mr O’Donovan what he would tell apprentices to do if they were not happy with the way a superior officer was testing them.

To his reply that he would tell them to “confront” the superior officer, the judge asked him if that was really a realistic course of action.

He replied: “Probably not.” But he added that, in his time, “there were no real issues” and there was a good “bond” between apprentices and their senior officers.

Read full article by Neil Michael at the Irish Examiner website below.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41857569.html

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Teenage Defence Forces apprentice’s death in 1991 was regarded as suicide within his platoon, tribunal hears

A teenage Defence Forces apprentice’s death in 1991, treated officially as an “accident”, was regarded as suicide within his platoon, it has been revealed.

04/06/2026 Dublin Irish leinster Ireland. Photo shows Col Damien Coakley arriving at the Defences Forces Tribunal taking place at the Infinity Building in Smithfield Dublin into claims of the culture surrounding the making of complaints of abuse. The tribunal is focusing on complaints processes in the Defence Forces spanning over four decades, from 1983 to 2024. Photo: Leah Farrell/© RollingNews.ie

It has also emerged that, as well as investigating his death, the Defence Forces had also investigated a complaint Oliver Mullaney had been mistreated by a superior officer just days before he died.

The head of the Defence Force’s military police revealed the existence of the two investigations into Mr Mullaney’s death to tribunal lawyers when they interviewed him last month.

The revelation by Colonel Damien Coakley is the first time it has ever been made public there were two Defence Forces investigations into Mr Mullaney’s death and that it could have been caused by anything other than an accident.

Under cross examination by the tribunal’s senior counsel Michael Cush, the Irish forces provost marshal and director of military police told tribunal investigators he had become aware of “certain issues” around the death of Mr Mullaney in 1991.

He said he discovered there were two investigations into the 19-year-old’s death.

He found this out after he had been instructed by the tribunal to look into the investigation of Mr Mullaney’s death.

Mr Cush said: “In assisting the Defence Forces prepare for this tribunal, you became aware there were, in fact, two separate military police investigations in relation to the death of [Mr Mullaney]”.

Read full article by Neil Michael at the Irish Examiner website below.

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41856930.html

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