Man caught sending sexually explicit images and messages to girls in sting operation

A 57-year-old man who was caught in a sting operation sending sexually explicit images and messages to three girls he believed to be under 14 has been remanded in custody.

Brendan Glynn of no fixed abode appeared before Castlebar Circuit Criminal Court where he pleaded guilty to six charges of Section 8 of the Sexual Offences Act which involved using communication technology to send sexually explicit material to a child.

The court heard that Mr Glynn was apprehended by people involved in organisations who operated bogus Facebook accounts purporting to be girls under 17 years of age in order to catch sexual predators. The defendant was arrested after the operators of the Facebook pages contacted Gardaí after he sent sexually explicit material but despite his arrest he continued to contact the person he believed was a teenage girl.

Detective Garda John Lynsky explained that on February 21, 2023 Gardaí received information from Gillian Duffy who volunteered with an online child protection team called Child Protection Agency based in Ireland.

She explained she operated a child decoy Facebook account of a 14 year old girl and forwarded the chat log history of the account she operated and that of Brendan Glynn as well as WhatsApp messages which were sent between February 3, 2023 and February 19, 2023.

Det Garda Lynskey explained that the messages were viewed and they were explicit in nature and the accused man stated he was from Castlebar. He added that Ms Duffy informed him she was 14 years of age from the outset.

Decoy account

On February 22, 2023, a second person called Christina Gregory from an online child protection team called Predator Exposure contacted the Gardaí to say she operated a decoy Facebook account of a 13 year old girl. She received a friend request from Mr Glynn on February 2, 2023 and the chat log history containing 334 pages of messages from February 2, 2023 to February 21, 2023 was forwarded to gardaí. They contained sexually explicit messages and images in nature with eleven images of a male penis being forwarded to the girl's Facebook account.

Mr Glynn was arrested on February 24, 2023 by Det Garda Lynsky and admitted to sending photos to the Facebook account and regretted the comments.

At the time Mr Glynn was staying in a hotel in Castlebar and Det Garda Lynsky confirmed the background of the hotel room matched that of the background images received by the teenage girl. Mr Glynn acknowledged he knew the girl stated she was 14.

Mr Glynn was subsequently charged and released on bail but on May 4, 2023 Gardaí received information from another person involved in Predator Exposure who operated a Facebook account purporting to be a 13 year old girl. She forwarded chat history between the accused and the decoy account between April 23, 2023 and April 30, 2024 which contained sexually explicit messages and images of a male penis.

Det Garda Lynsky added that gardaí also received information from Gillian Duffy on May 7, 2023 to state the defendant was once again communicating to the decoy Facebook account of a 14 year old girl she was operating. This communication lasted from April 21, 2023 to May 7, 2023.

Mr Glynn was arrested by Gardaí in a second Castlebar hotel where he admitted contacting her.

Mr Glynn was charged with six sample charges and Det Garda Lynsky explained that in one of the messages Mr Glynn said he was 'so looking forward' to tasting her p***y with his tongue. In another he said 'would you like to send you my horny c**k photo' and in another he stated 'I have a c**k photo for you dear, would you like me to send it?'.

Mr Glynn also sent images of a male penis while sitting on a chair and another image of a male standing in front of a mirror with a penis and torso visible.

The court heard that Mr Glynn is currently being investigated by gardaí for an incident in Castlebar library where a man was allegedly viewing inappropriate images of women on a library computer.

Det Garda Lynsky added that Mr Glynn is also charged with theft arising from an unpaid bill in the sum of €1,071.90 from a Westport hotel.

No previous convictions

Mr Diarmuid Connolly, counsel for Mr Glynn said his client has no previous convictions and anything he is accused of occurred in the last two years. He said he was a separated man who had gone off the rails in middle age after having had a history of employment until recently in the UK.

Mr Connolly asked Judge Eoin Garavan to remand his client in custody until October saying that this is a complex case which needed more exploration before a sentence can be finalised. He asked for a probation report along with a psychological report and a governor's report to be prepared before sentencing.

Judge Eoin Garavan said this was a very serious matter as Mr Glynn had continued to communicate with girls he thought were 13 and 14 years old after he had been arrested and charged.

He said the court doesn't know anything about Mr Glynn or his background and if anything plays a role in his offending behaviour. He agreed to the request for a probation and other reports but it was clear a custodial sentence will follow.

He remanded Mr Glynn in custody until October 30 for sentencing.