Gardaí probe how killer got rifle

Gardaí are investigating how Robert Hartery accessed a legally-held weapon which he used to murder his former partner Sarah Regan.

It emerged yesterday the 30-year-old mum-of-two was sitting in her car dressed in her pyjamas when Mr Hartery pointed a hunting rifle in at her and shot her twice in the head.

Mr Hartery, aged 45, shot himself dead after the murder, which took place in the small Roscommon village of Cloonfad on Friday night.

Garda sources said yesterday they will be speaking to the legal owner of the rifle, understood be an acquaintance of Mr Hartery.

All licensed firearms have to be stored in a secure safe and ammunition has to be stored separately.

Detectives will investigate if Mr Hartery had somehow managed to take the weapon and ammunition without the knowledge of his friend, or whether the owner gave it to him.

There have been reports that Mr Hartery had told his friend he was going to use the weapon for hunting. Garda sources said only the legal owner of a licensed firearm can use it.

Mr Hartery, a dad of three, had travelled with the gun from Co Tipperary, where he had been living, to Roscommon on Friday.

He had arranged to meet Ms Regan at the largely unoccupied Springvale estate. They had broken up, after a two-year relationship, several weeks previously.

The murder-suicide raises, again, issues regarding access to licensed firearms, of which there are over 200,000 in the country.

The tragedy in Roscommon comes just a week after two gardaí escaped being seriously injured or killed when taximan Anthony McMahon fired shots at them from two legally held weapons — a shotgun and a rifle — before turning one of them on himself.

This incident, which happened in Newport, Co Tipperary, also stemmed from family issues Mr McMahon had with his former partner.

Speaking last week in the Dáil about that event, and before the tragedy in Roscommon, Justice Minister Alan Shatter said: “Tragically, the House will have been reminded in recent days of the dangers which licensed firearms can pose for members of An Garda Síochána and others.

He said that a file would be sent to the DPP (despite the man being dead), as well as the coroner, who could make recommendations:

“At inquests, coroners can also make recommendations, so this issue could feature in that.”