Woman left care home 2 hours earlier than claimed

A JURY has found that an elderly woman who went missing from a nursing home on Christmas night and whose remains were found more than two years later on Bray Head had left the facility at least two hours earlier than staff at the home maintained.

Maura Reynolds, 78, care of Tara Care Centre, Putland Road, Bray, Co Wicklow was reported missing to gardaí after 7am on December 26, 2005, Dublin City Coroner’s Court heard yesterday.

Ms Reynolds’s remains were discovered in dense undergrowth on a very inaccessible area of Bray Head on February 19, 2008, less than a kilometre from the nursing home.

A postmortem by the Deputy State Pathologist, Dr Michael Curtis found that the cause of Ms Reynolds’s death was undetermined, but that under the circumstances she may have died of hypothermia and exposure, but that this was speculative.

When Ms Reynolds was reported missing to Bray Garda Station at 7.10am, gardaí were informed she was last seen at 12.30am.

She was not checked during the night and was found to be absent from her room at 6.50am on December 26.

A majority jury of six women and one man yesterday found that Ms Reynolds had actually been missing since 9.30pm on the evening of December 25, one hour after she was dropped back to the home by her son after spending Christmas Day with family, and returned a verdict of death by misadventure.

Care assistant Cora Wu gave evidence she saw Ms Reynolds between 11.30pm and midnight on the night of December 25 and was 100% sure it was her.

But CCTV footage show the lady on Putland Road at 9.37pm and at Strand Road at 9.41pm.

Her daughter-in-law Priscilla Reynolds welcomed the verdict and said it had brought closure.

“We’re anxiously awaiting the new regulations and I think that it’s extremely important they come into effect immediately. The home is still operating under the nursing home care act of 1993 and it’s a serious situation,” she said.