‘Catherine brought light to our lives and world’

Emma Gowing led the tributes to her sister outside court in Wales.

In a statement, Ms Gowing said: “Truth is truth. The facts are the facts. Our humanity shines when we conduct ourselves with kindness, with integrity, when we speak the truth.

“Catherine, my sister, was brutally murdered. That is a fact.

“Catherine conducted her life with kindness, with compassion, with integrity. That is the truth.

“The book of evidence painstakingly compiled by North Wales Police was based entirely on the facts. It resulted in a guilty plea by the defendant.

“That is a good thing.

“Our world is now a safer place. Catherine is happy that this is so.

“Catherine was an exceptional woman. She lived her life spreading compassion and love.

“She conducted her life in accordance with this quote from Albert Pine: ‘What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world is and remains immortal.’

“She was our light; she shone very brightly and enriched the lives of all she encountered, all God’s creatures.

“That light is gone from our world. It now shines elsewhere.”

Catherine Gowing, from Kinnitty, Co Offaly, studied as a vet in Budapest before moving to Wales to work.

She is survived by her parents John and Maureen, and sister Emma.

She had planned to return home to live in Ireland in December, to be closer to Maureen, 75, and John, 83, in the hope that she would take over the family farm and open a veterinary practice there.

Clive Sharp’s first conviction dated back to 1982, when he sent letters and used the telephone to make indecent and offensive remarks to a number of women.

Just a year later, he was jailed for three years after holding a piece of glassto the neck of a 15-year-old girl and raping her.

In 1994, Sharp choked and assaulted a woman, the wife of a friend, who refused his advances and two years later was jailed for eight years for false imprisonment and wounding.

He took a woman back to his bedsit, threatened her with a knife, and strangled her.

Prosecution lawyer Andrew Thomas told the court of previous reports on Sharp in which he admitted his offending “could escalate” and of his imprisonment and rape fantasies which had two endings — the woman lives when he grows tired of her or ends up dead, “either strangled or drowned”.