Ex-DUP chief found guilty of sexual abuse in Northern Ireland

NEWRY, Northern Ireland — The disgraced former leader of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, Jeffrey Donaldson, was found guilty Monday of committing a 23-year series of sexual crimes against two young victims.

After three days of deliberations, a jury found Donaldson, 63, guilty on all 18 criminal counts that he had sexually abused two women when they were children. The charges included 13 counts of indecent assault, four of gross indecency, and one of rape.

The jurors also found that Donaldson’s wife, Eleanor, had aided and abetted some of his crimes. She will not face any criminal penalty because Judge Paul Ramsey ruled she was too mentally unwell to face trial.

Ramsey ordered Jeffrey Donaldson — one of Northern Ireland’s most prominent politicians for decades — to be remanded in custody ahead of his scheduled sentencing Sept. 25. The judge told Donaldson he would be listed on the U.K.’s National Sex Offenders Register and must expect to face “a lengthy sentence.”

As the jury’s “guilty” judgment on each count was read out in Newry Crown Court, a stone-faced Donaldson stood between two security guards with his hands clasped together.

His legal team did not immediately indicate whether he would pursue an appeal.

Donaldson’s downfall as DUP chief in 2024 came weeks after he delivered the big achievement of his leadership — an agreement that spurred his party to resume its awkward partnership government with Sinn Féin at Stormont after a two-year deadlock.

Within hours of his arrest, a shellshocked DUP had suspended his party membership and removed all traces of Donaldson from its website.

At the outset, the judge handling Donaldson’s case granted anonymity to his two accusers. They were allegedly abused by the politician at various points from 1985 — around the time of his first election win at the age of 22 — to 2008.

The two women, identified only as Complainant A and Complainant B, told the court during the four-week trial that Donaldson had sexually assaulted them when they were children.

In the dock, Donaldson called his accusers liars and denied that a 2020 letter to one of them, in which he referred to “deep wounds” caused by his “sinful and selfish actions,” related to sex-abuse allegations. He refused to say what conduct he meant and insisted the letter was not an apology.