A retired cold case detective has said that the body of Deirdre Jacob - who went missing in Kildare on this day 24 years ago - must be located before anyone can be convicted for her murder.
Ms Jacob, who was 18 at the time, disappeared as she was walking home in Newbridge on July 28, 1998 - and in 2018 her disappearance was upgraded to a murder investigation. Wicklow man Larry Murphy has long been a suspect in the case, although the Director of Public Prosecutions recently decided that gardai didn't have enough evidence to charge him.
Speaking to Newstalk, Alan Bailey - who was the lead detective in the Garda Cold Case Unit before his retirement - said that Murphy remains a person of interest in the case. Mr Bailey said: "That is based on his modus operandi when he was involved in the abduction, rape and attempted murder of another female in the year 2000."
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Mr Bailey added that the trainee teacher's body would need to be found to solve the case, saying: “It is very difficult to prove somebody has been murdered if you don’t have the body to say, well this is the body of so and so. If the body is located tomorrow morning, I have no doubt it will be carefully examined."
Referring to the advances in DNA investigation, Mr Bailey said that there is "possibility of locating some bit of evidence on the body or at the body dump scene which might help secure a conviction.”
Mr Bailey appealed to anyone who know anything about Deirdre’s disappearance to contact gardai. He said: "I would be appealing to anyone out there who as any information no matter how small they think it is.
“It is a difficult thing to live with, taking a life, but it is also difficult to live with the knowledge of what happened and the knowledge that there is a family still grieving and still looking for answers and that all it would take is maybe a phone call. It might be time for that person that they pick up the phone and say this is what happened.”
Mr Bailey said that the last 24 years have been very difficult for Deirdre's family. She would have turned 43 in October.
"It has been a long, long time for her family, and they have lost an awful lot of milestones in the meantime with losing Deirdre," he concluded.
Gardai have asked that anyone with information relating to Deirdre Jacobs contact the investigation team in Kildare Garda Station on 045 521222 or the Garda Confidential Line 1800 666 111.
Read next:
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