David Tweed tributes 'massively disrespectful to victims'
- Published
David Tweed died after a motorcycle crash last month
The stepdaughter of a former Ireland rugby player who served four years in prison for child sex abuse has said politicians who paid tribute after his death "should have known better".
David Tweed, who died in a motorcycle crash last month, was also a former unionist councillor in County Antrim.
His child abuse conviction was subsequently quashed due to the way the jury was directed in his initial trial.
Amanda Brown was sexually abused by Tweed from the age of eight.
Her stepfather had represented the Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV) and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) during his political career.
TUV leader Jim Allister and senior DUP members Ian Paisley and Mervyn Storey paid tribute to Tweed after his death.
Ms Brown said they should have been more careful with their comments about her stepfather.
"I think it's massively disrespectful to victims, not only Davy Tweed's victims but all victims of abuse," she told BBC News NI's Talkback programme.
"The message that they're putting out is it doesn't really matter that we have heard about what this man has done, we'll still call him a great man.
"So to their daughters, their granddaughters, their nieces, their sisters, their mothers, their wives, their partners. they're saying: 'We won't support you.'
"[They're saying: 'We won't believe you if something similar has happened to you.'"
David Tweed was capped more than 30 times for Ulster
Tweed received four caps playing international rugby in the 1990s.
Both Mr Allister and Mr Storey described him as a "larger than life character" in tributes after his death.
However, Ms Brown said the larger than life Tweed that she knew was "a very big, aggressive, dominating, controlling man".
When she was a child he threatened with physical violence if she told anyone of the sexual abuse to which she had been subjected.
"He broke down and cried and told me that he would go to jail if I told anybody," she said.
"[He said] that if he went to jail then we would be on the streets and my brother and I end up in an orphanage and wouldn't see our mum again.
"I had that as an eight-year-old, trying to keep my family together to allow him to do what he was doing."
In response, Jim Allister said: "BBC in news programmes today is dishonestly putting words into my mouth in respect of what I said following the death of the late David Tweed.
"I expressed condolences to Mr Tweed's family and friends, described him as a larger than life character, who was widely known, and noted his family is deeply rooted and respected in the Ballymoney/Dunloy community.
"What is it in that with which the BBC takes issue?"
- Published29 October 2021
