William McGrath
Founder of TaraWikipedia
11
MENTIONS
4
EPISODES
4
PODCASTS
Search complete. 11 mentions across 4 episodes found for "William McGrath".
Sep 18, 2026
speaker_2ADVERTISER
[gentle music]
Ciarán DunbarHOST
William McGrath was an influential loyalist, founder of the paramilitary group Tara, and a hardline evangelical Protestant.
William McGrathSOUNDBITE_SPEAKER
In the British Isles, God has preserved for himself a small handful of people, the million Protestants who reside in that part of Ireland that is known throughout the world as Ulster.
Ciarán DunbarHOST
He was also, as it turned out, a notorious predatory pedophile.
speaker_5SOUNDBITE_SPEAKER
Kincora Boys' Home took in youngsters and teenagers from the courts or who were thought to be in moral danger.
speaker_5SOUNDBITE_SPEAKER
There'd been allegations of homosexual offenses here for over 20 years, but it was only last December that Mr. William McGrath, a prominent Orange man and a house father at Kincora, was jailed for four years for sexual offenses against boys in his care.
Ciarán DunbarHOST
Widely known as the Beast of Kincora, McGrath was convicted of abuse at the notorious East Belfast boys home and jailed in 1981.
Sam McBrideGUEST
For many years, the boys who stayed in that home were raped, um, were sexually abused in other ways by the people who were charged with caring for them, and McGrath was the housemaster there.
Benjamin FittonNARRATOR
In April that year, three members of staff at King Cora Boys' Home in Belfast were charged with a number of sexual offences.
Benjamin FittonNARRATOR
The warden James Maines, his deputy Raymond Semple and housefather William McGrath were jailed in 1981 after a two-year investigation into allegations of child sexual abuse and a child prostitution ring operated from the home for teenage boys.
Benjamin FittonNARRATOR
Reports had been made throughout the 1970s, but nothing was done until an alleged government cover-up was exposed by the media.
Benjamin FittonNARRATOR
There were rumors that Brian McDermott could have been killed by someone who had sexually assaulted him, and that the pedophile ring involved politicians, officials, and paramilitary organizations.
Andrew LownieGUEST
Um, but my, my, um, knowledge is that boys were taken to Classybourne and either abused in a local hotel or actually in the boathouse there, that he didn't go to, to, um, um, Kincora.
Andrew LownieGUEST
But I think Chris, uh, Moore, who's a BBC journalist who's written about Kincora, does have people who've come forward and talked about, um, uh, Mountbatten at Kincora a-and Mountbatten's friendship with William McGrath there.
Andrew LownieGUEST
Um, again, a number of the kind of whistleblowers who've come forward, Fred Holroyd and others, have kind of been, um, their credibility has kind of been attacked, uh, in an attempt to kind of shut down that bit of the story.
Andrew LownieGUEST
And I certainly had a big fight when I was doing the book to get Kincora material released, and eventually stuff was released.
Andrew LownieGUEST
But my knowledge is that boys were taken to Classeybourne and either abused in a local hotel or actually in the boathouse there that he didn't go to King Cora.
Andrew LownieGUEST
But I think Chris Moore, who's a BBC journalist who's written about King Cora, does have people who've come forward and talked about Mountbatten at King Cora and Mountbatten's friendship with William McGrath there.
Andrew LownieGUEST
um again a number of the kind of whistleblowers who've come forward fred holroyd and others have kind of been um their credibility has kind of been attacked uh in an attempt to kind of shut down that bit of the story and i certainly had a big fight when i was doing the book to get kenkora material released and eventually stuff was released and the file when it came was pretty much empty even though there were it was clear from the index that it was a very very large file But within the file, I could see that when they did the investigations to Kinkora, they picked tame judges.
Andrew LownieGUEST
They had very prescribed limits to what they would look at in terms of any investigation into Kinkora.