Ciara Breen, 17, from Dundalk, County Louth, Ireland went missing on 13th February 1997, on Bachelor’s Walk where she lived with her mother in a small terrace house. She was last seen by her mother Bernadette, who said at the time that they had both gone to bed just after midnight. That day they had gone to a local café for evening dinner then returned home. According to Bernadette, she was due to get the results of a biopsy the following morning from Blackrock Clinic and Ciara was worried about this. The two had a short conversation on Bernadette’s bed before both going to sleep just after midnight.

After 2 am, Bernadette got up to go to the bathroom and discovered Ciara was not in her room, nor her own bedroom. It was not the first time Ciara had snuck out during the night. She had left a window on the latch on the bottom storey of the house and it is believed she did so, so that she could climb back in.

It is considered the most likely scenario in Ciara's case that she decided to leave her home to attend a pre-planned meeting with someone that night. This was later verified by close friends of Ciara when interviewed by gardai.

Who was this person Ciara was meeting?

In this episode of Radio Espial, using analysis and interviews, Mick Rooney and Ciaran McConnell take a deep-dive into the case and the timeline of events.

EPISODE 41: The Murder of Ciara Breen

Patricia Furlong (21) from Dundrum, Dublin spent the night of Friday, July 23rd, 1982 with friends at her local pub, the Nine Arches. Just before midnight, some of the group of friends decided to head to the late night Fraughan Festival held at Johnnie Fox’s pub, Glencullen, in the Dublin Mountains.

In the early hours of the morning she was witnessed leaving the venue to go on a walk with a man described as dressed in an ‘all-white-suit’. Patricia never returned to her friends at the venue.
Around 8 am on Saturday July 24th, two teenage girls out for a morning walk discovered Patricia’s dishevelled body lying in a field. She was dead following a brutal strangulation with her own upper clothing.

Within weeks, a man emerged as a prime suspect, but it would be many years later before he was finally charged with the murder of Patricia Furlong.

Nothing proved straightforward in this case… a case 42 years later that still remains unresolved.

It will be a lesson to police, families and the general public that the outcome of a case can never be taken for granted.

EPISODE 46: DJ TO STRANGLER - The Murder of Patricia Furlong

Radio Espial

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