Baby John cold case probe ‘will go on for some time’

By Anne Lucey

More locations in Co Kerry will be targeted with door-to-door enquiries in an attempt to solve the mystery of the killing of a baby found stabbed to death near Caherciveen 34 years ago.

Superintendent Flor Murphy, who is spearheading the cold case investigation into the death of Baby John, said that there is no time limit for his unit to find answers, adding that the “investigations will continue for some time”.

The case of the Kerry Baby, known as Baby John after he was christened by the local undertaker, was surprisingly reopened in January, when an apology to Joanne Hayes, the woman wrongly accused by gardaí of being the mother and at one stage of being the murderer, was also given.

More than 9,000 hours have already been put into the case since January and the first door-to door-canvass since the original investigation began on Monday on Valentia Island.

DNA from the original investigation has been examined using new technology and conclusively established that Ms Hayes could not have been the mother of the baby found wrapped in plastic on a beach in Caherciveen.

Supt Murphy said that DNA will remain the focus as a team of up to 20 gardaí finalised their canvass on Valentia Island, which is home to around 600 people.

Questions are focusing on what, if anything, householders remember from the time of the infant’s discovery.

Valentia was not targeted in the original investigation which was wound up suddenly when the focus shifted to Ms Hayes’s hometown of Abbeydorney, wrongly, as it turned out.

In 1984, Caherciveen town, its girls’ secondary school, and the Over-the-Water area around the White Strand, a favourite courting spot for lovers with cars, were looked at as the focus of the original investigators had been on young, unmarried women.

Along with Valentia Island, a number of previously uncanvassed areas will also now be on the radar of the investigation team, and can expect door-to-door inquiries, Supt Murphy said.

Canvassing areas allowing face-to-face contact is a tried and trusted method. The investigation will continue,” Supt Murphy said.

Meanwhile despite a number of DNA samples being requested as well as being offered to the team, which has a special incident room in the Garda station in Caherciveen, and 225 separate lines of enquiry, no definite leads have been established.

Gardaí remain convinced the answers lie in Iveragh and that a number of people, possibly up to half a dozen, had to have known exactly who the mother of the child was and what took place. The assumption is based on the remoteness of the area.