Mother of cyclist killed in hit and run says Helen McEntee's failure to refer inquiry was 'shameful behaviour'

The family of Shane O'Farrell have campaigned for a public inquiry into his death.

The failure of former justice minister Helen McEntee to refer a scoping inquiry into the fatal hit and run of Shane O’Farrell to the Oireachtas Justice Committee before the election has been described by his mother as “shameful behaviour”.

Last July, Ms McEntee said she would write to the justice committee to ask it to look at the recommendations and conclusions of a scoping report into the death of the 23-year-old cyclist in August 2011. 

He was cycling home when he was struck by a car driven by Zigimantas Gridziuska near Carrickmacross in Co Monaghan in a hit and run.

The following day, the Lithuanian surrendered himself to gardaí. However, the O’Farrell family feel he should never have been at liberty to kill Shane.

On a number of occasions in the two years before the incident, he had been granted conditional bail but it had not been revoked despite broken conditions.

At the time of Mr O'Farrell’s death, he was on bail in connection with a number of separate incidents.

Two separate Gsoc examinations of different elements of the case were carried out, but a public inquiry has never taken place.

A scoping exercise of the case carried out by retired judge Gerard Haughton was published in July 2023, and a key finding was that an inquiry was unwarranted.

In response to a parliamentary question, published in recent days, Ms McEntee told Sinn Fein’s Matt Carthy: “As the deputy will recall, during statements on a private members motion seeking the establishment of an independent public inquiry in the Dáil last July, I undertook to write to the justice Ccommittee to ask it to look at the recommendations and conclusions of the scoping report. 

"Rather than write to the committee immediately before the general election was called, I decided to defer sending the letter until the next justice committee has been established.” 

Shane’s mother, Lucia O’Farrell, has campaigned for a public inquiry into her son’s death.

She told the Irish Examiner Ms McEntee, who is now heading up the Department of Education, had pushed her son’s case “down the road”.

She said: “The election was not in July, August, September, October. This is an appalling excuse. Shameful, shameful behaviour.” 

Ms McEntee’s pledge to write to the justice committee came after Sinn Féin, Labour, and Independent TDs brought a private members motion calling for the immediate establishment of “independent public inquiry into the death of Shane O’Farrell and the actions of State agencies before and after his death in respect of this case”.

The motion said there were multiple failures which led to Zigimantas Gridziuska being at liberty on the date of Shane O’Farrell’s death. 

It added it was “now necessary to have the actions of An Garda Síochána, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Gsoc, and the Courts Service examined in order to establish how such failures took place, including the information sharing systems between those agencies”.