NEW concerns about the behaviour of perv gym owner Shane Flynn were raised with Gardai during his trial, The Irish Sun on Sunday can reveal.
The group of women — from all over Ireland — were waiting to see the outcome of his case before deciding to make a formal complaint.
But they will not be making any statements after the personal trainer, 35, who ran the NGS Gym and Rehabilitation Clinic in Mullingar, Co Westmeath, received a 28-month sentence for sexually assaulting a woman in January 2021.
Creep Flynn — who had 34,000 followers on Instagram — sexually assaulted the woman as she was receiving treatment for back pain.
The women who raised concerns with cops during the trial were separate to the 37 women Flynn secretly recorded when they were changing at his gym from July 2018 until August 2020.
He positioned his laptop so he could see them undressing and covertly recorded them when they were receiving treatment from him.
A source told The Irish Sun on Sunday: “Gardai met with a number of women who came forward when Flynn’s trial started last October.
“They all had serious concerns about his behaviour and if he had not been convicted of sexual assault, they would have made formal complaints. There is a lot of admiration for the woman who went to court because she didn’t want other women to be targeted by Flynn.
“Thankfully justice has prevailed and Flynn has been prosecuted for a very serious offence and his despicable behaviour has been exposed.”
Gardai have encouraged any other women who may have been sexually assaulted or secretly recorded by Flynn to come forward.
The Irish Sun on Sunday can also reveal that the perv received some support from a millionaire businessman during his trial at Mullingar Circuit Criminal Court.
The source added: “The businessman was at court for a lot of the hearings.
GARDAI ‘ALWAYS TWO STEPS AHEAD’
“Flynn comes across as very arrogant and even when he was being interviewed by Gardai about the offences, he thought he was clever.
“But due to the nature of the evidence gathered, the Gardai were always two steps ahead of him.”
Flynn, who won four county championships with St Loman’s GAA club, appeared on RTE show Special Forces: Ultimate Hell Week in 2019.
Ahead of the programme, he said: “I’m the type of leader that thrives on pressure.
VICTIM ‘MADE WORLD SAFER’
“If someone with a weaker personality says that Shane Flynn is very cocky, I can’t do anything about that. I’ve got to keep driving on who I am.”
Following his conviction, Judge Ronan Munro said Flynn’s victim had “made the world a safer place” over her decision to come forward.
After completing his sentence, Flynn must remain under probation supervision for one year and complete a sexual offending treatment.
But Judge Munro also told the court how his exploitation of his victim’s vulnerability was “particularly insidious”.
FLYNN ‘CROSSED THE LINE’
In a moving victim impact statement to the court, his victim said: “After this happened to me I completely lost my spark and became increasingly anxious. He entered a not guilty plea when all along he has been guilty.
“Shane Flynn tried to lie about the entire assault and portray me as the person who was wrong, the person who crossed the line when in fact it was him. It’s the most vulnerable position I have ever been in my life.”
The probe into Flynn was run by the Gardai’s Divisional Protective Services team in Meath and Westmeath.
