The killing of beautician Rachel Kiely (22), just a few hundred yards from her home in October 2000, sent fear through the local community in Ballincollig and greater Cork and beyond.
That a young woman, a member of the Jehovah's Witness community, could be raped and killed was shocking enough, but what made it even more terrifying was that that she was killed in normally peaceful Ballincollig Regional Park so close to her home.
Developed by Cork County Council on the site of the gunpowder mills at the old British army barracks, the Regional Park had become a popular spot. It was well known to Rachel Kiely.
Living in nearby Inishmore Square estate, she frequently walked along the network of paths which meander through the copses and parkland flanking the southern bank of the River Lee.
On October 26th, 2000, Ms Kiely took a walk there with the family's two dogs. Within an hour or so of leaving home at about 4.30pm, she had been accosted, raped and killed by her then 16- year-old neighbour, Ian Horgan.
Her mother, Rose, became concerned when the dogs returned home at about 6.30pm. A search got under way involving her family, members of the local Jehovah's Witness community and gardaí.
Ms Kiely's body was discovered 25m from the ruin of an old house in the park. It had been partially concealed with briars and ferns but it was clear to gardaí that she had suffered a violent death. A murder hunt was launched.
Ballincollig, then as now, was a burgeoning satellite of Cork city with large numbers of young families who, united in shock, became fearful. Parents collected children from school and people stopped going to the Regional Park.
Recently returned from working as an au pair in Italy, Ms Kiely was due to attend a Bible-reading class on the night she was killed.
At her funeral, her uncle, Max Warden, an elder of the church in Britain, said: "Rachel was a lovely person. If you went to her room, you would always see the Bible open. She was always reading from it. She loved the Bible and she loved Jehovah. During the past month, she was going from house to house, preaching the word of God.
"People are asking why something like should happen to a righteous woman such as Rachel but the answer is to be found in the Bible. Rachel learned at an early age that Jehovah loved all mankind," said Mr Warden.
The sense of disbelief reverberated again some three weeks after Ms Kiely's death when gardaí arrested and charged her neighbour with her murder. Horgan was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in June 2002. But the Court of Criminal Appeal set aside the conviction in December 2004 on grounds relating to the trial judge's directions to the jury as to how it should approach DNA evidence in the case.
A retrial was ordered. Horgan, after spending almost six years denying Ms Kiely's killing, pleaded guilty to her manslaughter, a plea with which ultimately the jury agreed when it acquitted him of murder but guilty of unlawfully killing and raping her.