Category: Child Victim

83 – The Disappearance of Philip Cairns

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Cold Case, Irish Crime, Kidnapping, murder, unsolved

On Thursday the 26th of October 1986, Philip Cairns left his Ballyroan Road home after eating his lunch. He was headed back to school. But he never made it there. An intensive search followed, but there were no signs of the 13 year old.

A week later, his school bag was found in a nearby laneway, left there by persons unknown. Despite searches of the Rathfarnham area, including rivers, overgrown areas, large parklands and in the foothills of the Dublin mountains, there was no further sign of the school boy.

What became of Philip Cairns?

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79 – Savage: The murder of James Healy

On By Hugh DevineIn Child Victim, Drug-related, Insanity Defence, Irish Crime, Life Sentence, Mental Health, murder, Organised Crime

In February of 1996, 16 year old James Healy was found brutally beaten in a field near his home in Tralee. It wouldn’t be long before gardai zeroed in on their prime suspect – a 25 year old man diagnosed with anti social personality disorder.

In fact, police feared that he would one day murder.

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66 – A Family Destroyed: The murder of Becky Watts

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Controversial Case, Domestic Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, Kidnapping, Kids who Kill, Life Sentence, Mental Health, murder, sex crimes, UK Crime, Women Who Kill

In February of 2015, 16 year old Becky Watts was reported missing by her family. A city – wide search ensued for the shy and socially anxious teenager.

But it would turn out that Becky, and the answers about what had become of her, would be found much closer to home than initially thought.

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59 – A Miscarriage of Justice: Nora Wall

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Controversial Case, Human Rights, Irish Crime, Landmark Case, Life Sentence, Mental Health, sex crimes, Wrongly Accused

In 1996, former nun with the Sisters of Mercy Nora Wall was accused of rape by a girl who had formerly been in her care at a group home in Cappoquin, Co Waterford. Alongside her, a homeless man, Paul “Pablo” McCabe, who had once been resident at the same institution was also implicated.

The two went to trial, but the affair would later be declared a miscarriage of justice. 

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58 – Murder by Mistake: Melanie McCarthy McNamara

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Controversial Case, Drug-related, Human Rights, Irish Crime, Kids who Kill, Life Sentence, murder, Organised Crime

Gangs and drugs effect nearly every community. But in 2012, the Dublin suburb of Tallaght was shocked by the spillover of violence. 16 year old Melanie McCarthy McNamara was shot while she sat in the back of a parked car on a residential street. The gunman had shot from the back of a black SUV and sped off immediately. 

Two men alleged to be involved in drugs locally were identified by gardai, and after protracted court battles have found themselves in prison in relation to Melanie’s killing.

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56 – Predator: The deaths of Patricia McGauley and Mary Cummins

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Domestic Violence, Human Rights, Intimate Partner Violence, Irish Crime, Life Sentence, murder, sadism, sex crimes

1990 was a decade of missing women. We remember the names of the unfound – Annie McCarrick, Eva Brennan, Jo Jo Dollard, Deirdre Jacob.

The names Patricia McGauley and Mary Cummins were once on that list. These two women disappeared from Dublin in the space of a year, and it wasn’t until a large scale review of cases of missing women from Dublin that a startling link was discovered between the two women. Both of them had unknowingly spent time with a predator: Michael Bambrick.

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55 – Murder by Arson: The McCann Family

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn affair, Child Victim, Controversial Case, Domestic Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, IRA/Paramilitary links, Irish Crime, Landmark Case, Life Sentence, Mental Health, murder, murder for profit

In the summer of 1992, the McCann Family endured a series of gas leaks in their home, and a spate of threatening phone calls. These nuisances escalated quickly though, and culminated in a raging fire in their Rathfarnham home. Esther McCann and her foster daughter, Jessica, died in the blaze.

Investigators ruled that this was a case of arson, and gardai quickly discovered that Frank McCann – the grieving father and husband – had some dark secrets.

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54 – The Serial Child Murders of Robert Black

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Controversial Case, Irish Crime, Kidnapping, Life Sentence, Mental Health, murder, sadism, Scottish Crimes, Serial Killer, sex crimes, UK Crime, unsolved

A stranger snatching a child off the street is thankfully a rare thing. But throughout the 70s and 80s, in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, a number of young girls disappeared as if into thin air while walking alone. Most went missing in broad daylight. Some were found – their bodies dumped hundreds of miles from home. Some remain missing, presumed murdered.

In 1990, police in Scotland realised that many of these cases were linked. A delivery driver living in London was responsible for them all. Despite getting into trouble throughout his youth for sexually motivated attacks on younger children, Robert Black had been free to roam the country and target girls for decades.

*Episode Image: Jennifer Cardy (via The Irish Times Archive)

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50 – Murdered Abroad: The story of Jason Corbett

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Child Victim, Controversial Case, Domestic Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, Irish Crime, Mental Health, murder, Self Defence, US Crime, Women Who Kill, Wrongly Accused

In August of 2015, a Limerick man, Jason Corbett, was found dead on his bedroom floor of the master bedroom of his lavish family home in North Carolina. His young wife and her father were covered in blood hen police arrived, and a bloody baseball bat and paving brick were found in the bedroom. They told the police that Jason had been killed in self defence. 

But Molly and Tom Martens would both face trial for the murder of Jason Corbett. The Limerick man’s family fought for justice, and for custody of his two young children, which was watched by people, both at home and abroad.

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49 – Wrongful Conviction: Tim Evans & the serial murders of 10 Rillington Place

On By mensreapod@gmail.comIn Capital Punishment, Child Victim, Controversial Case, Domestic Violence, Human Rights, Insanity Defence, Intimate Partner Violence, Landmark Case, Serial Killer, sex crimes, UK Crime, Vintage murder, Wrongly Accused

A man is hanged for the murder of his child, and presumed to be the his wife’s murderer, too. But three years later, in the same house that the couple had lived, more bodies were found.

Six More. 

Including the wife of the man who had been the Crown’s star witness against Tim Evans in his murder trial.

This is the story of the serial murders of John Reginald Christie at Ten Rillington Place. 

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