Family and friends unite to remember Sheola’s 21st

IT should have been one of the proudest days of his life.

But instead, a grieving father laid flowers yesterday on the grave of his murdered daughter to mark her 21st birthday.

And at a poignant mass in Cork later, Peter Keaney joined family and friends to pray for Sheola, who was strangled in July 2006 by her ex-boyfriend.

Mr Keaney travelled from Clonmel to Cork and said the journey to the cemetery in Cobh, and passing the spot where his daughter’s remains were discovered dumped in undergrowth, was “one of the saddest journeys of his life”.

“It’s tragic to think that today, Sheola should have been getting dressed up and looking forward to her party. And she was some girl to enjoy a party,” he said.

“Instead she’s lying in the graveyard.”

Mr Keaney was joined by close family and several of Sheola’s friends for the mass in the town’s convent.

Mr Keaney said his daughter’s friends were planning their own private function afterwards and he asked the media to respect their privacy.

“They will remember Sheola in their own special way,” he said.

The teenager’s body was found wrapped in two plastic bin-liner bags and dressed only in her underclothes in a laneway in Cobh in July 2006. She had been beaten and strangled.

Her ex-boyfriend, Thomas Kennedy, aged 21, of 84 Russell Heights, Cobh, was found guilty of her murder. Mr Justice Paul Carney imposed a mandatory life sentence.

Mr Keaney reiterated his calls last night for more counsellors to be made available to provide support for the friends and family of murder victims.

“I would appeal to any counsellors out there who are qualified to help friends of victims of homicide to contact me. There is an urgent need for volunteers to help,” he said.

* Mr Keaney can be contacted on 086-840 6502.