Clarissa's Cause: Mum Rebecca donates extra funds to charities

More than $50,000 has been donated to help Rebecca Saunders exhume the body of her daughter Clarissa McCarthy to bring it back to America with her

Rebecca Saunders, with a picture of her beloved daughter Clarissa McCarthy. 

A mother who is campaigning to have her little girl’s remains removed from the coffin of the man who killed her has donated €10,000 to Cork charities, thanks to the public’s support.

Rebecca Saunders first spoke publicly to the Irish Examiner about how difficult it was to have her precious daughter Clarissa McCarthy – her only child at the time – buried in the same coffin as her father, Martin McCarthy, the man who killed her.

Public support for her campaign, Clarissa’s Cause, quickly raised $55,349 (€46,651.52) to help Rebecca exhume Clarissa’s body and bring her remains home with her to America.

Any extra money raised was to be donated to Cork University Maternity Hospital and Edel House, a shelter for domestic abuse survivors. Although Clarissa’s body has not yet been returned to her mother, Rebecca has started to donate any extra funds, starting with €5,000 for each of the charities.

“I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you again for supporting Clarissa’s Cause,” Rebecca said in a video posted on her GoFundMe page.

“It’s still an ongoing process, I have not been able to take Clarissa home yet.

“It is definitely going to happen in time, probably closer to next year. I did take the opportunity with the generosity that has been poured out to me to make a donation to the neonatal unit in Cork as well as to Edel House. 

I have been able to donate €5,000 each to those charities all because of your support and your help and I am very grateful for that.

“We will be able to celebrate soon when I have Clarissa back with me.” 

Clarissa McCarthy was just three years old when she was killed by her father, Rebecca’s then-husband Martin McCarthy, who then killed himself at Audley Cove, a little beach by their house in West Cork, on March 5, 2013.

In a haze of grief and shock, Rebecca allowed Clarissa to be buried in her father’s arms.

But almost since the coffin closed, she has regretted that decision.