Playing in the Dark

In 1977, Eamonn Cooke was a household name in Ireland. He’d launched the controversial pirate radio show, Radio Dublin, from his cramped living room in Inchicore and for youngsters everywhere in Ireland he was a public hero. But there was a terrible side to this trendy ‘granddaddy of Irish radio’ that no one could ever have imagined. When Siobhan Kennedy-McGuinness first ventured into Cooke’s garage, to her seven-year-old eyes it was like an Aladdin’s cave. Filled with broadcasting equipment it became a playground for her and her friends. And for Cooke, it became a place he could lure his unsuspecting victims. Cooke’s abuse was calculated and terrifying. Siobhan suffered in silence for years. Then one day, almost twenty years later, she saw the man who had haunted her life holding the hands of two wide-eyed children. In their faces she recognised her own fear. Finally, she knew she had to reveal Cooke for the monster he really was.