Hit-and-run deaths ‘shocked the nation’

THE tragic death of two Irish women in a hit-and-run accident in Rome last week had touched the entire country, mourners at a funeral mass for one of the victims heard yesterday.

Sympathisers gathered at St Michael’s Church in Athy for the requiem mass of Mary Clare Collins — the 29-year-old graduate who was one of two friends killed as they returned home from a night out to celebrate St Patrick’s Day in Rome.

The pair were struck by a car driven by Friedrich Vernarelli, 32.