‘We cannot heal until we know’ - Community rallies to help family

A leading psychiatrist has said the exact circumstances surrounding the murder-suicide of twins Paddy and Thomas O’Driscoll and their brother Jonathan needed to come to light before the stunned local community of Charleville could come to terms with what had happened.

“As soon as we have correct information about the sequence of events, about what exactly happened, that will help the doubting and the questions, and that will, in itself, help people to integrate and process what has happened,” Professor Patricia Casey, consultant psychiatrist at the Mater Hospital said.

“At the moment, some of it is speculation. As soon as people know what the story is, the story with the young boys, and particularly the older boy, that will help people to understand and come to terms with what has happened.”

She said that Irish communities dealt well with death, even terribly difficult and tragic deaths that were difficult to understand, but that an understanding of the events surrounding the deaths were necessary to help the grieving process.

Postmortem examinations on the bodies of the nine-year-old twins were carried out at Cork University Hospital (CUH) yesterday.

Gardaí said last night they were not releasing details of the postmortems for operational reasons.

The postmortem on the body of their brother Jonathan, 21, confirmed that he died by suicide. Investigating officers in Charleville are not looking for any other person in relation to the incident.

The twins’ bodies were discovered in their home in Deerpark, on the northern outskirts of Charleville shortly after 5pm on Thursday. It is understood that they died violently. Jonathan’s body was found a short time later, 14km away in the town of Buttevant. Jonathan’s body was removed from the scene on Thursday night, while the bodies of Thomas and Paddy remained in their home overnight to allow for a technical examination of the murder scene.

Charleville curate, Fr Tom Naughton said the community was standing in solidarity with the O’Driscoll family.

“They’re doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances,” Fr Naughton said.

“They’re holding themselves very well. They have a large family around them who are very supportive and are helping them to cope.”

Traffic outside the O’Driscoll home on the N20 Cork-Limerick road came to a standstill shortly after noon yesterday when family and friends surrounded the hearses as the cars pulled out of the driveway on their way to CUH. Fr Naughton led the 50-strong group in an impromptu prayer service for the boys in the middle of the road.

Afterwards, he said that Helen and Thomas’s faith was a comfort to them at this difficult time.

“It’s very important to them and I have no doubt in my mind that it will help them to cope and to get through it,” he said.

The twins were in third class in Banogue National School in Croom, Co Limerick. Outside the school, parents discussed how to explain the events to the boys’ schoolmates.

“You just tell them to pray for them, think of their mum and dad. They’ve lost friends, but the mum and dad have lost three sons and the other kids in the family have lost three brothers, so we just have to think of the family this morning,” one father said.