{"id":137657,"date":"2025-10-22T05:50:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T05:50:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/137657\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T05:50:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T05:50:10","slug":"dublin-firefighter-charged-with-rape-in-boston-takes-stand-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/137657\/","title":{"rendered":"Dublin firefighter charged with rape in Boston takes stand \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Dublin firefighter charged with rape in Boston<\/a> took the stand on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Terence Crosbie (39) is accused of raping <\/a>a 29-year old attorney<\/a> in a hotel room he shared with his fire brigade colleague, Liam O\u2019Brien. <\/p>\n

The complainant previously testified that she met Mr O\u2019Brien at the Black Rose bar on March 14th, 2024, and went with him to the Omni Parker Hotel where they had consensual sex. Mr O\u2019Brien then fell asleep and began to snore. She then got into the other hotel bed and later awoke to a man she didn\u2019t know raping her and telling her that his \u201cfriend\u201d was a \u201closer\u201d, the court heard. <\/p>\n

Mr Crosbie presented a different story. \u201cThere was nobody in my bed, my bed was empty,\u201d he told the court. Mr Crosbie insisted he \u201cabsolutely did not\u201d rape the complainant or have any physical contact with her at all. <\/p>\n

The complainant said when she arrived at the hotel room with Mr O\u2019Brien at about 11:55pm, the room was empty, and when she awoke to the alleged assault at about 2am the bathroom light was on. <\/p>\n

Mr Crosbie said he and Mr O\u2019Brien had been randomly assigned as roommates, travelled with a group of more than 10 firefighters to march in the St Patrick\u2019s Day parade, and arrived in town earlier that afternoon. After a night of bar hopping with his colleagues, in which the married father of two admitted kissing another woman at The Black Rose, he returned to the hotel room shortly before Mr O\u2019Brien, and began fiddling with the radiator. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe door to the room opened behind me shortly thereafter,\u201d he said. He claims he did not exchange words with Mr O\u2019Brien or the complainant but that he \u201cread behind the lines and more or less immediately left\u201d. He waited on an armchair by \u201cthe lift\u201d for two hours. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I say \u2018lift\u2019 I mean \u2018elevator\u2019,\u201d Mr Crosbie clarified to the American jurors. <\/p>\n

The Dubliner\u2019s Irish accent was noted frequently by defence attorney Daniel C Reilly who asked his client to \u201cspeak slowly and clearly so people can hear you even if it\u2019s slower than usual\u201d. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Dublin firefighter present during alleged Boston rape \u2018refusing to participate\u2019 in trialOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Mr Crosbie told the court he would never use the word \u201closer\u201d as was attributed to him by the complainant, calling the phrase \u201cAmerican slang\u201d. <\/p>\n

The complainant testified that the bathroom light was on at the time of the assault, and the room was partially illuminated, although she could not recall the assailant having birthmarks or tattoos, stating she was focused on finding her way to safety. <\/p>\n

Mr Crosbie testified that the room was dark when he returned, he used his phone as a torch and \u201cscooted\u201d the clothing left on his bed on to the floor, pulled back the covers and went to bed in his boxer shorts. He heard someone get up, gather their clothes and leave a short time after. <\/p>\n

The court saw the defendant had eight tattoos, on his arms and legs. <\/p>\n

The court previously heard Mr Crosbie booked an early fight home after he was questioned by police. The state closed their case with video of Mr Crosbie being apprehended on an Aer Lingus flight later that evening. <\/p>\n

Mr Crosbie testified that after he was questioned by police, he spoke to his superior officers, who flew in with another group of Dublin Fire Brigade members on a later flight. He said he approached them \u201clooking for advice\u201d and insisted \u201cI didn\u2019t do this\u201d. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Boston rape trial complainant tells court she woke up with stranger on top of herOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

When he returned to his room, he saw the door was left open. He told the court he was suspicious that \u201csomeone had been in my room\u201d and felt like a \u201crabbit in the headlights\u201d due to the \u201cbig allegation\u201d against him, so he packed his bags. <\/p>\n

\u201cDid you leave because you had committed a crime and wanted to escape?\u201d asked Mr Reilly. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I did not.\u201d<\/p>\n

Assistant district attorney Erin Murphy asked Mr Crosbie about his interview with Boston Police, noting he asked officers multiple questions about the <\/b>\u201clegal terms\u201d of rape and the complainant\u2019s allegation. <\/p>\n

\u201cIs she saying someone pinned her down and had sex with her?\u201d Mr Crosbie asked, according to Ms Murphy who read from a transcript of the police interview. <\/p>\n

Ms Murphy asked Mr Crosbie about an account he gave to police regarding masturbation. Mr Crosbie allegedly told police he masturbated in the bed when Mr O\u2019Brien was at breakfast, and asked if it was possible for his DNA to get on the complainant that way. <\/p>\n

Ms Murphy noted the timing of his arrival the previous day. \u201cYou didn\u2019t really have time separate from Mr O\u2019Brien in the hotel room,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cTrue,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere was no breakfast for Liam that morning in Boston,\u201d Ms Murphy said. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou were telling that story to try to anticipate why your DNA might be found,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo that\u2019s not true,\u201d answered Mr Crosbie. \u201cMy DNA was not found on her body,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t touch her,\u201d he told the court. <\/p>\n

Earlier that day the court heard from the state\u2019s witness, Rebecca Boissaye, a criminalist at the Boston Police Crime Lab, who testified that she was able to identify the complainant and Mr O\u2019Brien as DNA contributors in the samples collected.<\/p>\n

Because the material collected was overwhelmingly female, Ms Boissaye recommended additional Y-STR testing, or male-specific testing. Searching for DNA is \u201clike finding a needle in a haystack\u201d; the Y-STR process is \u201clike a magnet\u201d because it only identifies male DNA, she said.<\/p>\n

Forensic criminologist Alexis DeCesaris, a senior analyst at Bode Technology, conducted Y-STR testing and found \u201ca mixture\u201d of two male individuals in the samples but stated that \u201cno conclusions could be made\u201d identifying either Mr Crosbie or Mr O\u2019Brien as contributors. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe mixture profile did not meet our threshold to confidently determine and say that both contributors were represented adequately in the mixture profile,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

Defence attorney Patrick Garrity suggested the second male contributor could be due to a secondary transfer, rather than direct contact, or contamination. <\/p>\n

\u201cEven when evidence is collected and packaged and tested under strict protocols and strict contamination controls, low-level DNA can still appear on an item due to trace transfer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d said Ms DeCesaris.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Dublin firefighter charged with rape in Boston took the stand on Tuesday. Terence Crosbie (39) is accused…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":137658,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,52,13,14,6,11,12,15,16,5,7,8,384,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-137657","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-dublin","11":"tag-featured-news","12":"tag-featurednews","13":"tag-headlines","14":"tag-latest-news","15":"tag-latestnews","16":"tag-main-news","17":"tag-mainnews","18":"tag-news","19":"tag-top-stories","20":"tag-topstories","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-world","23":"tag-world-news","24":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137657\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}