‘We are heartbroken but at least we got justice’

“THERE’S no joy anymore. There never will be without Siobhán.”

With a simple stark statement, Brighid McLaughlin forcefully reminded people how the loss of a loved one through an act of murder leaves an unbridgeable void in the lives of the victim’s family.

Not even the wheels of justice which had delivered a guilty verdict on Brian Kearney could adequately compensate the McLaughlins for the absence of a sister whom she described as “the light of our lives”.

Reacting to the verdict which convicted Brian Kearney for the murder of her sister Siobhán on February 28, 2006, Ms McLaughlin said her own life and that of her family had been altered forever as a result of the murder, even though she was thrilled by the jury’s decision.

“Even though he has gone off in a van tonight, we’re still left with a huge absence. We don’t feel complete without her. The pain will never leave us,” she said.

Ms McLaughlin, a former journalist, said she had many happy, cherished memories of her time spent on holiday in Spain where Siobhán ran a hotel.

Siobhán, who was the fifth eldest of seven girls in the McLaughlin family, was someone without any airs or graces, recalled Brighid.

“She was a total sweetheart,” she remarked, pointing out how her sister regularly dropped off food parcels to the Iveagh Hostel and Simon Community in Dublin.

Ms McLaughlin, said she had also been upset at comments during the trial which suggested her late husband Michael Shannon had died as a result of suicide.

Counsel for the DPP, Denis Vaughan Buckley SC, yesterday asked the Central Criminal Court to note that an inquest into Mr Shannon’s death in November 2003 had delivered a verdict that he had died as a result of accidental drowning.

“I had thought life could not get any worse but it did,” said Brighid in reference to her husband’s death.

However, she declined to comment on her feelings about her brother-in-law or the future for the couple’s young son, Daniel.

Siobhán’s mother, Deirdre McLaughlin, said she had derived great strength and consolation from the words of a family friend who is a nun.

“She called me the day after Siobhán died and told me that her soul went ‘straight to heaven, so fast that one could not measure the time it took.’”

Ms McLaughlin, a mother of eight children, said those words had stayed with her family over the past two years.

“That’s what keeps us going — our faith in God. Without him, there is nothing,” she remarked.

Ms McLaughlin said it was wonderful that justice had been done by the guilty verdict against her son-in-law.

“We are happy. We are still heartbroken, of course, but at least he had been brought to justice,” she added.

Asked by reporters about the ordeal of the past two years, Ms McLaughlin said they were “absolutely, horrendous, absolutely unbearable”.

She allowed herself the briefest of smiles to note that there was “a tiny bit of closure but it will never be closed”.

Siobhán’s close friend, Ann Clohessy, hugged other pals who had faithfully attended most days of the hearing outside the courtroom. “It’s fantastic. We got justice for Siobhán today,” said Ms Clohessy, who was one of the last people to see Siobhán alive.

Paddy Kearney, a younger brother of the convicted murderer, declined to comment as he left the Four Courts building accompanied by his other brother, Niall and Brian Kearney’s daughter, Aoife who had sat devotedly by her father throughout the 13-day hearing.