The family of murder victim Siobhan McLaughlin have revealed they are writing individual letters of objection to killer Brian Kearney’s latest bid for release.
Tragic Siobhan (38) was murdered by her remorseless husband Brian Kearney, when he strangled her with a hoover flex and tried to make it look like suicide, at their home in Goatstown on February 28, 2006. And now the remorseless killer has launched his fourth bid for release - with him due to appear before the parole board in the coming months.
Speaking exclusively to the Irish Mirror, Siobhan’s sister Aisling revealed she and the rest of her family are right now in the throes of writing individual letters to the parole board - in a bid to stop Kearney in his tracks. She said: “As I speak to you I’m with my father here helping him to write his letter to the parole board.
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“My entire family are right now writing their letters from whatever part of the world they’re in.” Aisling says the family were notified that Kearney was once again applying for parole for a fourth time - in this his 15th year behind bars for the murder of his wife.
“We would have been notified a few months back, there's been a kind of changeover for the parole board in that time and now we are able to meet with them as well so we’re in the process of organising those meetings too,” she revealed. But the heartbroken sister says it pains her that evil Kearney, who has never expressed remorse for his horrific crime, will get to read each and every one of their letters.
She said: “He gets to see them. We don’t get to see what he says about why he should get parole but he does get to enjoy reading ours.” Aisling says she does not wish to share the contents of the family letters yet, as they’ve yet to be sent to the board - and she says she hasn’t yet brought herself to write her own one, as the very thought of it makes her feel sick.
She said: “In a general sense our letters are objecting vociferously to any application in every sense because you’re talking about an unrepentant convicted killer here. So if he’s unrepentant then he must be in denial. That’s not a very safe character to be having out and about I wouldn’t imagine.
“It’s actually 15 years since he went to prison; it's 18 years since Seany died. I was with one of my other sisters here this morning and we were going through the parole letter and we just cannot believe it. It’s still so bloody raw.”
Talking about the anguish of writing her own letter to the parole board Aisling added: “I’ll be honest with you, it's something we’ve been dealing with for the last few weeks and I’ve actually been unable to kind of put my own pen to paper yet. It actually makes me feel physically sick. I know all my sisters feel the same uneasiness and just sick to the stomach basically about having to revisit this.”
Aisling says it also pains the family that even if Kearney is once again unsuccessful in his bid - he gets to apply for parole again in the next two years. She said: “And again knowing even if he doesn’t get anywhere with this application he’s up and out looking for it again in 18 to 24 months, so there’s no kind of peace really.”
In the past Aisling says she left it to other family members to send in their letters of objection - as she felt Kearney never really had a chance of being released then. But she says she now fears the possibility of his freedom.
She said: “It’s the first time that I’ve personally done it. This is his fourth parole application. He was going nowhere with the other ones. It’s very much a reality now. As time goes by maybe his chances increase. People have told us he’s still not going to get out, but you can’t trust the things you hear.
“Now is the time where he might be making some sort of inroads. On a personal note I still feel he’s not going anywhere, and I do have to hope that, especially in light of the fact that he hasn’t shown any remorse. The criteria is to have some sort of remorse. If you have remorse then you have some sort of admission but he’s not going there.
“Why in God’s name would anyone be considered for parole if that one essential ingredient of remorse isn't there?” Evil Brian murdered his wife because she intended to leave him.
The monster strangled Siobhan in her room, then used a Dyson vacuum cleaner flex as a ligature before trying to hoist her over the en-suite door in her bedroom in an attempt to make it look like a suicide. Their three-year-old son lay sleeping in the next room at the time and Siobhan’s body was later discovered by her family who broke into the bedroom after failing to contact her.
The prosecution alleged he killed Siobhan because she was planning to leave him, something that would have placed him under severe financial pressure. Kearney was handed down a life sentence in 2008 after being found guilty by a majority verdict of 11 to 1 at the Central Criminal Court.
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