Two detectives from West Yorkshire Constabulary, investigating the murder of an elderly woman three years ago, visited Dublin this week. They interviewed a man already suspected of killing two psychiatric patients in Grangegorman in March last year.
The man is being held in Mountjoy Prison on other serious charges. He has not been charged with the murder of the two patients, Ms Sylvia Shields (59) and Ms Mary Callinan (61), although he is known to have made a number of confessions about killing them.
The two English detectives are investigating the murder of Ms Dorothy Wood, who was suffocated in her bed in the Fartown area of Huddersfield. A man has been charged with her murder.
The Crown Prosecution Service in Leeds directed that the man in Mountjoy Prison be interviewed because he lived in Huddersfield at the time Ms Wood was killed and his name appears in statements allegedly made by the man accused of her murder.
The English detectives interviewed the man in Mountjoy Prison but it is understood he said he had no knowledge of the crime.
The Mountjoy inmate lived in Huddersfield for most of his life but left the area after a dispute with a local drug dealer in 1996. He was living in north central Dublin in March 1997 when Ms Shields and Ms Callinan were attacked while sleeping in their beds. Both died of severe head injuries after being mutilated and battered with a blunt instrument.
Gardai in north central Dublin initially arrested and charged an innocent man, Dean Lyons (25), of Tallaght, with the two murders. He was held in custody for nine months before the Director of Public Prosecutions decided to withdraw the charge.
Nothing has yet emerged from an internal Garda inquiry into the wrongful charging of Lyons. A former heroin addict who had learning difficulties at school, he is currently serving a sentence for a syringe robbery. i were horrified at the nature of the murders of Ms Callinan and Ms Shields. Both women were mutilated and killed by a man of considerable strength.
After killing Ms Shields and Ms Callinan he their assailant went to the room of the a third resident but stopped and left the house without harming her.
The woman, who was on a separate floor from the other two women, slept through the entire incident. A forensic psychiatrist added urgency to the Garda investigation into the Grangegorman killings by warning there was a danger the killer would strike again.
Lyons was arrested at a hostel in the grounds of the former Grangegorman Hospital on July 26th last year. He was charged with the murder of Ms Callinan.
However, a month later gardai outside Dublin arrested another man in the immediate aftermath of a serious crime.
While being questioned the second man made a full confession to the Grangegorman killings. His statement contained detail which could only be known to the murderer, according to gardai.
It emerged subsequently that Lyons's statement contained obvious discrepancies.
During the summer, gardai sent a new file on the Grangegorman murders to the DPP. The investigation into the background of the second man revealed he had spent time in England and contact was made with detectives in West Yorkshire.