Gardaí investigating the murder of Josephine ‘Josie’ Ray (89) in Co Tipperary last weekend have arrested a man and a woman for questioning about the killing.
Detectives arrested a man and a woman in their 50s in the last hour on suspicion of murdering the mother-of-five whose body was found at her home at St Joseph’s Park in Nenagh on Sunday.
The pair, whom it is understood were known to the dead woman, have been brought to separate garda stations in Co Tipperary for questioning about the murder which has shocked the town.
They are both detained under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act which allows gardai to hold suspects for up to 24 hours before they must be charged or released.
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A grandmother and great grandmother, Ms Ray was found unresponsive at her house by a family member at around midday on Sunday and they immediately contacted the emergency services.
Ms Ray was pronounced dead at the scene and gardaí immediately cordoned off the scene and requested the services of the State Pathologist’s Office.
A postmortem on Ms Ray’s body by Deputy State Pathologist, Dr Yvonne McCartney, on Monday confirmed that Ms Ray had died from asphyxiation and gardaí opened a murder inquiry.
Officers began door to door inquiries in the St Joseph’s Park area while they also began canvassing homes and businesses for CCTV footage to see if they could identify any possible culprits.
Garda technical experts were able to establish that there was no sign of forced entry at Ms Ray’s two storey terraced house leading to the belief that she may have known her killers and admitted them.
Gardaí confirmed during the week that they were pursuing “a strong line of inquiry” in their investigation and garda sources suggested on Thursday that arrests might well be imminent.
Today’s arrests come just hours after Ms Ray was buried at Killodiernan Cemetery following her funeral mass at St Mary of the Rosary Church in Nenagh this morning.
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