The family of Aoife Beary who remains in a critical condition after falling from a collapsed balcony in Berkeley, California, last month are expecting her recovery to be “long and slow”.

A judge has denied a construction firm’s attempt to “spy on” a criminal probe into the Berkeley balcony collapse that killed six and injured seven students.

The owners and others responsible for the the building in Berkeley, California, where six Irish students died could face manslaughter charges, the local District Attorney indicated yesterday.

The first of the Irish funerals for the victims of last week’s balcony collapse in Berkeley, California, take place in Dublin today.

The families of the Irish students killed in a balcony collapse in the US have said the response of their friends to the tragedy is a testament to the bonds between them.

Local court reports have shown that the builder of the Berkeley apartments had paid off more than $6m (€5.2m) in law suits because of bad balcony building practices.

Images of rotting wood left exposed by the deadly collapse of a balcony in Berkeley are “incredibly similar” to pictures used in a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the construction company that built the complex where six students died, it was claimed last night.

Plans are being put in place to repatriate the bodies of Irish students Olivia Burke, Eimear Walsh, Eoghan Culligan, Niccolai Schuster and Lorcan Miller who all died after a balcony collapsed in California.

A SOCIETY where light-touch building regulation, among other things, facilitated the construction of a fire trap so dangerous — Priory Hall in Dublin — that residents had to be removed by court order for their own safety should probably think twice before responding angrily to the news that the company that built the Berkeley apartments where six students died this week paid $3m last year to settle a case over alleged defects in apartment buildings.

The balcony below the one that collapsed, killing six young students, including five Irish, was removed yesterday after being branded an immediate “collapse hazard” by Berkeley city inspectors.

They came in groups, pairs, wearing county colours, leaving cards, candles, flowers, pictures, a half pint of beer, even a wheel hub.

In the aftermath of the balcony collapse in which six Irish students died on Tuesday, attention in Berkeley has now turned to the construction of the Library Gardens apartment complex at the centre of the tragedy.

The families of six students killed in a balcony collapse in the US are expected to learn today the early indications of the cause of the accident.

Authorities have sealed off all the balconies in the apartment building where six students plunged to their death during a 21st birthday party.

News of the tragedy which has claimed the lives of six Irish people and left a number of others seriously injured first emerged when the Berkeley Police Department received an emergency call at 12.41am local time (8.41am Irish time).

Both local people and some of those living in the same apartment building outlined the chaotic scenes in downtown Berkeley after a balcony peeled off a fourth floor apartment, plunging Irish students down to the ground with tragic consequences.

Safety officials in Berkeley are inspecting the apartment complex where six Irish students were killed after a balcony collapsed.

Noisy, with a disintegrating ceiling and prone to homeless people sleeping in the stairwell, the Library Gardens complex where six Irish students died yesterday has received damning online reviews since it opened less than a decade ago.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny led Dáil tributes to the six students who died in the Berkeley tragedy.

As dawn broke in California, the San Francisco bay area woke up to news of the horrific events that had unfolded in the student city of Berkeley shortly before 1am California time.

Lying 15km across the bay to the north-east of San Francisco, Berkeley is a popular west coast draw for Irish college students on their J1 trip to the US.