Niece finds Aunt dead in bedroom
The body of 37-year-old Lorraine Crowley was discovered in the bedroom of her Upper O’Connell Street home in Dungarvan, Co Waterford. Ms Crowley’s young niece found the body at around 8.30am.
Ms Crowley was lying fully clothed on the bed. Several marks and bruising were found on her neck and she also had a mark close to her right eye.
Assistant state pathologist Marie Cassidy, together with a team of forensic experts from Garda headquarters, arrived at the house in the afternoon.
The woman’s body was later brought to Waterford Regional Hospital where a full post-mortem examination was carried out by Dr Cassidy last night.
Superintendent Michael Blake, who is heading up the investigation, said the Garda was treating the death as suspicious.
However, he said gardaí are appealing for any information on the woman’s movements on Wednesday.
The deceased had only been living in the house at Upper O’Connell Street, a quiet residential area, for two months. She previously lived at Parklane Avenue in the Abbeyside area.
Her mother, Doreen Crowley, and her thirteen-year-old son, David, also lived with her. However, she was alone in the house on Wednesday night because her mother was in the Waterford Regional Hospital and her son spent the night with relatives.
The death of the popular woman, who hailed from the rural area of Ballinameela, has shocked her O’Connell Street neighbours and her friends.
Paddy Whelan, a peace commissioner who lives across the road from the Crowley house, said the deceased and her mother were very quiet neighbours who essentially kept themselves to themselves.
“You wouldn’t even know they were there at times’’, he said.
Mr Whelan added that Ms Crowley was still a very warm and friendly person, and everyone in the street was deeply shocked and saddened at her untimely death. “You just don’t think that things like this will happen in your own area,” he said.
