This article is from page 4 of the 2008-11-04 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
, will this week
(Wednesday night, 9pm) focus on the
Brendan O’Donnell tragedy, while
it will also look back at the Patrick O’ Dwyer case.
The final part of the series, next
week, will look at the unsolved mur- der of Ennistymon woman Emer O’Loughlin, on the Galway/Clare border in 2005.
In a case that shocked the na- tion, Brendan O’Donnell murdered Imelda Riney, her three-year-old son Liam and Galway priest Fr Joe Walsh. Their bodies were found in Cregg Wood in east Clare in 1994.
O’Donnell was subsequently con- victed of the triple murder, but died in 1996 while serving his sentence at the Central Mental Hospital in Dub-
lin.
Patrick O’Dwyer, from Shrohill, Ennistymon, killed his 17-year-old sister Marguerite in a frenzied at- tack at their home on November 29, pAuers
O’Dwyer hit his sister six times on the head with a claw hammer and in- flicted more than 90 stab wounds to her body. He told gardai he had con- templated suicide and attacked his sister while she watched television, as he feared she would get in the way of his suicide attempt. He later came
clean to gardai. “It’s like being inside a room with a video and I can’t turn it off,” he told gardai.
At the Central Criminal Court in June 2007, O’Dwyer claimed a de- fence of diminished responsibility, in that he suffered from a mental disor- der when he killed his sister.
The jury in the trial agreed and found him guilty of manslaughter, by reason of diminished responsibil- ity. He was sentenced to six years in jail.
This week’s hour-long programme will address the issue of balance of mind and the prevalence of mental health issues among a high percent- age of those who commit crime in Ireland.
The third Clare tragedy to be in- cluded in the series is that of Emer O’Loughlin. The 23-year-old’s body was discovered in a burnt out cara- van near Tubber in April 2005. No- one has ever been held accountable for her killing. The story of Emer’s killing is one of three unsolved cases being highlighted in the documen- Fe AY
The series is produced by Sideline Productions. It examines the rise in Irish murder rates and assesses the impact of the various killings on the families left behind. It is presented by former T’V3 crime correspondent Maura Derrane.