A Garda file into the death of a mother of two found murdered in her Dublin home last year still has to be submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions, an inquest heard today.
Supt Tom Gallagher said detectives were continuing to investigate the murder of Rachel O'Reilly who was found lying with fatal head injuries inside her house in Baldarragh, Naul, in north Co Dublin.
She had been battered to death with a blunt instrument. Supt Gallagher from Balbriggan Garda Station applied for a six-month adjournment under Section 25(1) of the Coroners Act. He said: "A file hasn't been submitted yet."
Solicitor Peter Mullins, who was representing her husband, Joe O'Reilly, at the Dublin County Coroners Court in Tallaght, said he had no objections to the application for an adjournment to March 14th 2006.
The coroner, Dr Kieran Geraghty, passed on his sympathies to the family of the deceased.
When her inquest first opened in March, State Pathologist Professor Marie Cassidy said the cause of death was blunt force trauma to the head.
Her parents, Jim and Rose Callely, who were at the first sitting in March, heard the mother of two died after sustaining severe multiple head injuries, including a fractured skull and damage to her brain.
Gardaí believe that Mrs O'Reilly died some time between 9.30am and 11.30am on October 4th, 2004.
Detectives leading the investigation suspect that when she returned home after dropping her two sons to school and to Montessori her killer was waiting for her.
Mobile phone records from the chief suspect have been gathered by gardaí. A nationwide check for a make of car believed to have been used by the killer has also been carried out.
The possibility that the suspect may have hired someone else to carry out the killing has not yet been dismissed.
Mrs O'Reilly's body was exhumed from her grave in the Fingal Cemetery in March. It was reported that a document was recovered from the coffin which could be used to catch the killer.
Although a number of people were arrested as part of the investigation, to date no one has been charged.
PA