Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
DANIEL MCDONNELL WAS 17-years-old when he shot teenager Melanie McCarthy McNamara dead in February 2012 in a case of mistaken identity.
He had meant to kill the teenage girl’s fiancé, in a notorious tit-for-tat gang feud in Tallaght, Dublin. After he was caught, McDonnell wrote a letter to his brother from St Patrick’s Institution where he was being detained.
He made several detailed references to the killing, including; “Two in the head, the b***h is dead.”
Criminologist John O’Keeffe, who features in a new TV3 documentary on teen killers, said the letter shows no concern about the fact that this could be used against him as evidence.
“He just didn’t care, because he made his mark,” he explained.
Other than McDonnell’s self-incriminating letters from prison, and graffiti he wrote on a cell wall, there was no other evidence against him. They eventually led to his conviction and he received a mandatory life sentence.
The documentary, which airs tomorrow night at 9pm, looks at four cases and asks what is going on with society that makes the most vulnerable turn into the most violent.
Violence
One of the most tragic and inexplicable cases featured is the murder of 14-year-old Darragh Conroy in Laois. He was killed by 15-year-old Darren Goodwin with a metal hammer taken from a metalwork class at school.
Goodwin had grown up never knowing his father and when his behaviour took a turn for the worse in his early teens, his mother believed he would benefit from a strong male influence. She introduced him to his father and sent him to live with him just outside the town.
His behaviour then spiralled out of control. He attempted suicide and at one point told his classmates he would “love to kill someone that nobody cares about, someone like Darragh Conroy”.
In November 2003, Darragh’s body was found in an area of waste-land called Smith’s Field on the banks of the Owenass river. He had been struck six times with a metal hammer, five of the blows administered while he lay on the ground.
Later that evening, Goodwin confessed to classmates what he had done and told them where the murder weapon was. He was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison, however the judge used his discretion, to review the sentence after ten years. In 2013, his sentence was reviewed and he is set to be released in July this year.
The documentary, ‘Ireland’s Teen Killers’ airs tomorrow on TV3 at 9pm.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
This is result of letting a cult like group involve into our way of life support by a blind and deaf pc brigade. It to late for change Ireland has little hope and maybe some other countries. The UK is finished it be very hard task to undo what has grown there.
@: you mean Christianity?
@: are you talking about jehovahs? Mormons?
Actually they are not that bad once you get to know them
Admittedly they have some odd customs with blood and marriage and beliefs ;-)
Returning Islamic State Jihadis popping back to receive their benefits.
Send them back to their Islamic state and let e SAA, Kurds, Syriacs, Yazidi, Iraqis finish them off….https://au.news.yahoo.com/video/watch/36225430/yazidi-children-held-by-islamic-state-found-in-hospital-basement-in-mosul/#page1
More Rats leaving the sinking ship that is isis . There’ll be plenty more of this type of arrest in the coming weeks , however Mayor Khan will try and get them housed in Chelsea , in those new 1.8 million pound council houses .
Don’t be daft. Sadiq Khan’s alright. And the last thing he wants is more terror tearing through the streets of London.
@Mick Tobin: Don’t be daft ? This is the man who wanted the president of the United States banned because he had put a temporary ban on 6 countries , while the mayor himself when he was a lawyer defended Islamic militants , pushed for Louis Farakhan to be allowed into the country , even though he had called for a genocide of white people , had shared speaking platforms with convicted islamic terrorists , has spoken at muslim meetings where isis banners have been flown , called moderate muslims ”Uncle Toms” and says the Met Police do not have enough funds to follow returned Jihadis , even though he took money and personnel from their resources to set up a unit to chase down people who said things against islam on social media platforms .
@Ken Hayden: I will look into this, but contexts do matter. The mayor of Rotterdam, also a muslim, has also been accused of sharing the stage with people with radical ideas, but he in fact told them to p*** off elsewhere if they didn’t like it here.
Khan is right to shun divisions in the city, and my feeling’s been that this has been behind what he’s done, at least recently.
But sure, it pays to be critical, and I’ve taken note of what you just said. However, I now need to badly go and play Irish tunes in the pub, so I bid you goodbye for now.
@Ken Hayden: defended Islamic militants? Can you clarify whether that was as a lawyer or as a citizen? Also can you clarify that it wasn’t perpetrators of 9/11 as was previously stated on this site?
@Mick Tobin: He was a legal consultant for Zacarius Moussaoui , the shoe bomber .
There are links here to various news reports and video clips , if you follow them you will open up a trail . I will give you two links , one about Khan and the other about the Quilliam foundation .
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-03-27/london-mayors-ties-extremism-call-commitment-fighting-terror-question
https://medium.com/@jonasspooner/blowback-in-manchester-and-why-quilliam-must-be-investigated-f9472be1f26c
@Ken Hayden: In the second link you will also find a connection to Irish Jihadis . I probably couldn’t say the name here , but you will find it .
Why even entertain them. Round up their family and put them all on a flight back to where they came from. Free flight home, everyone is a winner. Especially the UK taxpayer.
@KingBen: put their families back on flights to Leicester and Birmingham?
@Richard Lippy Collins: no, they are not from Leicester or Birmingham. I’d suggest the middle east somewhere, doesn’t really matter. Just out of the country that welcomed them and gave them free houses, education, health and opportunities.
@KingBen: yep,lock stock,and barrel,,,total
Muslim and western values are not compatible we must stand up and defend our native cultures before Islamic domination prevails . it’s simple, Europe must wake up. Many parts of France,Britain,Holland and Belgium it’s too already too late . Ultimately it’s a numbers game, we must not ever allow what’s happened in Germany(2015) to happen elsewhere or else it’s all over
There should be super severe law for that, if found connected to terrorist cell they should have UK citizenships scraped and sent back to Turkey, never allow them back. With law like this all terrorists to be will think twice.
Those pesky atheists at it again…. Oh wait
Islam is to spread in every country and this is meant to be a good thing….. come on cop on, their way of living not suited for western life sure most of them say it themselves, only one solution if you want to fit in adjust to the country you choose to live in and respect our Christian value and our country, nobody’s saying convert but just remembered your choose to move to Christian Europe, and stop playing the race card when you don’t get your ways….
have your say