Ex-Ireland coach given 15.5 years in prison for sexual assault
Gibney, 78, a coach of Irish swimmers at two Olympics, has been convicted of sexually assaulting four female athletes. In the 1990s, he escaped prosecution, but in 2025 he was extradited from the United States after new charges
Former Irish Olympic swimming coach George Gibney, 78, has been sentenced by a court in Dublin to fifteen and a half years in prison for sexually abusing four young athletes in the 1970s and 1980s.
Gibney was found guilty of 39 counts of sexual misconduct and one count of attempted rape.
Gibney was Ireland's coach at the Los Angeles Olympics (1984) and Seoul (1988). In the 1990s, he was tried to prosecute, but the court found the statute of limitations expired, and the coach went to live first in Scotland and then in the United States.
In 2020-2022, four victims, who were minors at the time of the crimes, testified to the police, and in 2025 Gibney was extradited to Ireland.
