A community mental health nurse has been unanimously acquitted of six charges of sexually assaulting a woman who had a mental health disorder and was under his care.
Ian McKeegan, 56, was found unanimously not guilty of committing the offences, alleged to have been committed in May and June 2019, in his home at Ivy Mead Court in the Waterside area of Derry.
The jurors returned their verdicts after one hour and fifty minutes of deliberations following a ten day trial at the Crown Court in Coleraine.
During the trial the jurors were told that the complainant, who cannot be named for legal reasons, reported her allegations to the police in January 2020 and said that the abuse included kissing, touching and sexual activity and that the alleged offences took place in the defendant’s home.
Mr McKeegan, in his evidence and cross-examination, repeated that the alleged offences “definitely did not happen”.
He said he and other members of the Western Health And Social Care Trust’s Crisis Response Team dealt with the complainant once or twice a year over a ten year period. During that period she had delusional thoughts, hallucinations and made unsubstantiated allegations against other staff members.
“I have always been thoroughly professional with her”, he told the jury. “It was a professional relationship, nothing else, we definitely did not have a relationship other than a professional relationship”, he added.
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