Badly burned body found in Galway

A badly burned body has been found in Co Galway, gardaí said tonight.

The discovery was made shortly before midday in Ballinasloe.

A garda spokesman said officers from the Technical Bureau have arrived at the scene to carry out an examination and the State Pathologist's office has been contacted.

“An investigation is being carried out into the circumstances surrounding the find,” he said.

The body was found in a shed at the back of a housing estate during a garda-led search for 28-year-old local man Richard Carrick, who has been missing since last Saturday.

Superintendent Peader Kearney of Ballinasloe Garda Station said that because of the poor condition of the body they could not tell whether it was that of a man or a woman.

“We are currently running an investigation into the circumstances surrounding a missing person,” he said.

“That person was reported missing to us last Monday.

“We were carrying out a number of searches in the past couple of days. The body was found this morning by a civilian who was working with us,” he said.

Mr Kearney said the investigation was at too early a stage to rule out foul play and refused to be drawn on whether they believe the body to be that of Mr Carrick.

“We’ll know more when the post mortem is done and we can get some level of identification, but at this stage we are not in a position to identify the remains as that of Richard Carrick,” he said.

Mr Kearney added State pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy was en route to the scene.