Dead woman may have suffocated
Gardaí probing the death of the 37-year-old in her Dungarvan, Co Waterford, home are this weekend expected to upgrade their investigation. They were last night still treating the death as suspicious.
Lorraine Crowley’s body was discovered in her bedroom by her niece on Thursday morning.
The senior officer heading up the investigation, Superintendent Michael Blake, has reaffirmed the gardaí are continuing to treat the death of the mother-of-one as suspicious and said that the incident has not been upgraded to one of murder.
Superintendent Blake confirmed the detailed post mortem examination carried out at Waterford Regional Hospital on Thursday night by state pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy had come up with a conclusive finding.
However, he refused to comment on mounting speculation that she died of suffocation.
The original garda belief was that the woman had been strangled because of a number of marks and bruising were found on her neck, suggesting a violent struggle.
Gardaí are also strongly of the belief that her attacker may have been known to the deceased but Superintendent Blake wouldn’t officially comment.
A number of local people were interviewed by gardaí yesterday, including neighbours of the dead woman at Upper O’Connell Street where she had moved to reside in the three-bedroom single storey house only in the last two months.
“We have received a huge level of co-operation which we are most appreciative of,” Superintendent Blake said, “but we are renewing our appeal to anyone who might have even the slightest piece of information to come forward.’’
There are reports a neighbour overheard raised voices coming from the deceased’s house on Wednesday night, some eight hours before the grim discovery of her body.
“We are checking this out also,” Superintendent Blake said.
The dead woman has a 13-year-old son who was staying with relatives on Wednesday night.
