DALKEY "HOUSE OF HORRORS" - NEW DEVELOPMENTS

[Apart from the conviction in 1999 of Nora Wall on bogus charges of raping a child, I think this is the ONLY case in which an Irish jury accepted "Recovered Memory" evidence. Of course a Coroner's Court is not the same as the Central Criminal Court but it was still a very bad precedent. Hopefully the verdict will be overturned.

Rory Connor]

Family in Bid to Overturn Inquest Ruling on Stab Baby
Irish Independent , 12 May 2007 by Ann O'Loughlin

A FAMILY is to mount a High Court challenge to overturn a controversial inquest ruling on baby found stabbed to death in a laneway 34 years ago.

The inquest found the baby was a daughter of Cynthia Owen - but her family, who have disputed claims she was abused as a child, still insists the baby was not hers.

In a new twist to the tragic story of the baby unidentified for over 30 years, it has emerged that Cynthia Owen's father and three of her sisters have begun High Court proceedings.

Last February, after four days of emotional testimony at the Dublin County Coroner's Court, the jury found that the baby - which was stabbed and in a plastic bag, wrapped in newspapers - was the child of Cynthia Owen.

Incest
Returning an open verdict into the baby's death, the jury named the family home at White's Villas in Dalkey, Co Dublin as the place of death on April 4, 1973.

Ms Owen, who claimed the child was conceived as a result of incest, broke down when the verdict was read by the chairman of the jury.

But now, Ms Owen's father, Peter Murphy Senior, and three of her sisters - Esther Roberts, Margaret Stokes and Catherine Stevenson - will apply to the High Court on Monday for leave to bring judicial review proceedings in which they will seek to overturn the jury's verdict, delivered on February 16 last.

Yesterday, counsel for the applicants, Caroline Kelly, sought to move the application but Mr Justice Roderick Murphy said the appropriate place to do so was in the High Court on Monday.

Under court rules, such an application must be moved within three months of the disputed decision . The deadline is next Wednesday. The proceedings have been brought against Dublin County Coroner Dr Kieran Geraghty.

During the inquest, Ms Owen testified she was raped repeatedly from the age of seven or eight into her teenage years by four different people.

One of those persons was identified as her brother, Peter Murphy Jnr. The inquest was also told that five out of six female relatives who were brought up together had alleged sexual abuse at the family home.