Man held over cyclist’s hit and run death
He had been detained in Bandon, Co Cork, under section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act as part of a continuing investigation into the death of charity cyclist Paud O’Leary, 42, at Scrahanfadda, Gneeveguilla, Co Kerry, on July 1, 2012.
Gardaí did not divulge the reasons for the man’s arrest. No personal details about the man were disclosed.
Last April, Shane Fitzgerald, aged 23, of Upper Knockeen, Knockduff, Meelin, Newmarket, Co Cork, was given a six-and-a-half-year jail sentence, with the final 18 months suspended, after being convicted of dangerous driving causing the death of Mr O’Leary.
He was also disqualified from driving for 10 years.
The late Mr O’Leary, a father of four, had been cycling early in the morning of July 1, 2012.
A jury found that he had been hit by a vehicle which did not remain at the scene on the Killarney to Gneeveguilla road, shortly after 5am.
Mr Fitzgerald was seen on CCTV having several drinks in Killarney bars and then getting behind the wheel of his Toyota Land Cruiser.
His Circuit Criminal Court trial heard he was driving the Land Cruiser home after a night out with friends when he hit Mr O’Leary and failed to stop.
He had pleaded not guilty to the charge.
Worried family members found the body of Mr O’Leary in a roadside drain, along with his damaged bicycle, approximately eight hours after the incident — less than 2km from his home.
Despite intensive searches, the Land Cruiser was never found.
It emerged in evidence that Mr Fitzgerald had travelled to England the day after the incident, and then made his way to Australia.
He returned to England in early 2014, and was arrested as he was about to board a flight back to Australia on February 11, 2014.
He was extradited back to Ireland and charged. He was found guilty by a jury in a unanimous verdict following a four-week trial in April.
Mr O’Leary’s widow, Margaret, spoke out after the trial, saying the term imposed “doesn’t add up” compared to the devastation caused to her family. She called for stiffer penalties for drivers involved in such incidents.
Her family had been destroyed and her children were still going through trauma and sleepless nights, she said.
“Five years for putting a family through that!” Ms O’Leary remarked.
Her call for longer sentences was not about revenge, she said, but about sending out a message to men and women who drove after consuming large amounts of alcohol.
