Funeral details announced for Cork brothers

Paddy and Tom O’Driscoll, the nine-year-old twins killed in their family home in Charleville in North Cork, will be buried separately to their older brother Jonathan who took his own life.

The bodies of all three will lie in repose at O’Malley’s Funeral Home at New Line in Charleville from 1.30pm until 4pm tomorrow when they will be removed to Holy Cross Church in the town.

Requiem Mass for the three boys will then take place at the Holy Cross Church in Charleville at midday on Monday with Paddy and Tom being buried afterwards at Holy Cross Cemetery in the town.

Following the burial of the twins, Jonathan will be buried at 3pm at Kilmallock Cemetery in Co Limerick where he will be laid to rest beside his grandparents in their family grave.

Earlier, postmortems by the Deputy State Pathologist Dr Michael Curtis established that the twins suffered multiple stab wounds and would have died quickly.

Gardaí have declined to release Dr Curtis's findings for operational reasons but The Irish Times has learned that both boys were stabbed repeatedly in what appears to have been a frenzied attack.

“Both boys suffered multiple stab wounds – up to 40 wounds – it appears to have been a frenzied attack and it would appear that both boys would have died quite quickly,” said one source.

Meanwhile Dr Curtis’s postmortem also confirmed that the boys’ older brother, Jonathan O’Driscoll (21) died from asphyxia and gardaí are satisfied that he took his own life.

Jonathan O’Driscoll’s body was found near a tree beside the Awbeg River in Buttevant – some 15kms from Charleville- by some children playing in the area around 6.30pm on Thursday evening.

Gardaí also believe that two knives recovered from near where Jonathan O’Driscoll was found were used by him in the attack on his two younger brothers at the family home at Deerpark in Charleville.

However they are still awaiting final results of some technical tests on both kitchen knives and a third knife found in the family home to conclusively confirm they were the weapons used.

Anyone affected by the tragedy of what happened in Charleville and Buttevant can contact the Samaritans around the clock on 116123 or by emailing jo@samaritans.org.