A man has been found guilty of sexually assaulting and false imprisoning his sister-in-law.

The jury have also been told to return verdicts of not guilty by direction of the trial judge on a charge of oral rape of the woman and two charges of assault causing harm to her.

The 55-year-old man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, pleaded not guilty to six counts in total, including two of rape, and charges of assault causing harm, sexual assault and false imprisonment at locations in Co. Kerry and Co. Limerick on January 20, 2011.

After deliberating for just over two hours the jury of nine men and three women convicted the accused of sexually assaulting the woman by biting her breast at her home.

They also found him guilty of false imprisoning the woman who is in her sixties, by forcing her into a car.

It was the State’s case that the man had pulled her by the hair into her bedroom before punching her in the head and forcing her to perform oral sex on him in the house. A verdict of not guilty by direction of the trial judge has now been entered in relation to these allegations after the judge told the jury there was insufficient evidence to support the relevant three charges.

The single charge remaining for the jury relates to an allegation that he orally raped her at an unknown location on the car journey from her home to a town in Co Limerick.

In her direct evidence the woman told the jury that the accused had raped her in her house, calling her a “whore and a prostitute”, and later raped her orally in a car.

One garda witness who took a statement from the woman said that she told him the man had tried to have sex with her on her bed but she had fought him off. She said that he then forced her into his car by the hair of her head.

The trial, which is going into its eleventh day, continues before Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy and a jury of nine men and three women.