CATHERINE DWYER stabbed her father Edward to death in the living room of their home to Harelawn Green, Clondalkin, Dublin, around midnight three weeks before Christmas. One month later to the day she hanged herself in the same house.
It was the last of many suicide attempts by the 26 year old woman and the tragedy has angered local people.
"We believe if this was in a more affluent area this would not have happened," says local county councillor Mr John O'Halloran. "Everybody had warned the health services about attempts made to take her own life."
"They kept taking her children from her but they did nothing for her, is a comment typical of angry locals' criticisms of the Eastern Health Board. "She had a problem and there was no one would listen."
Specifically, they believe, the EHB should have got her into a psychiatric hospital long enough for her to have received treatment to enable her to sort out her life.
The EHB says she had been an inpatient and an out patient of St Logan's psychiatric hospital in west Dublin since last August, that health care workers had kept frequent contact with her and that she knew she could contact St Loman's for assessment, and if necessary admission, at any time.
She was one of four sisters and two brothers. She appears to have had little contact with her siblings following her mother's death about a year ago.
She was an alcoholic and unmarried and her children were periodically taken into care.
Local people say she lived in a number of places, including a mobile home, and had to leave some of these places due to disputes with neighbours. When she was between homes she would return to live with her father.
Local people described suicide attempts last year, before she killed her father. On one occasion she cut her wrists and on another she threw herself into the canal.
On December 5th, she stabbed her father seven times in the chest while her four year old son slept on a settee in the same room. Her other son, aged 10, was asleep upstairs. There was nobody else living in the house. Her two daughters, aged seven and eight, were in foster care.
She went voluntarily to Ronanstown Garda Station, where she made a statement. She was then brought to a relative's house and was later admitted to St Loman's Psychiatric Hospital as a voluntary patient.
Within days, she had signed herself out.
Following the killing of her father, her life seems to have gone further out of control.
HER children were now in care. She was afraid of sleeping in the empty house and sometimes spent the night in other houses in the locality. On at least one occasion she slept on the ground outside the house and out of sight of passers by. She was drinking heavily.
On Christmas Eve she tried to strangle herself with bootlaces. She ran onto the street and was helped by passers by. That night she was brought to St Loman's. She was discharged the next day.
Several people in the locality saw her on the day of her death and she was in good form, though they say it was a pattern with her to be in good form shortly before making an attempt on her life. That evening she was found hanged inside the house.
A health care worker visited her every day for the last two weeks, but local people believe the EHB should have kept her in hospital during this time, if necessary against her will, in view of her history of suicide attempts.
Ronanstown Garda Station is considered in the locality to be the only State agency which displayed a continuing and friendly interest in her from the time of her father's death. Gardai checked on how she was getting on, called around quickly whenever she was in trouble and on one occasion a garda went to St James's Hospital to drive her home when she was discharged.
Local people expressed a strong view that the attitude of the gardai was the attitude which they believed the EHB ought to have displayed.
A local curate, Father Joe Coyne, is also regarded locally as having given her considerable support, visiting her every day, and getting a television for her. They say that a nun also helped her.
But the Eastern Health Board, local people believe, is the agency which could have mobilised effective help for her and in their view it failed in this regard. A sister of Ms Dwyer's said she did not believe the hospital had given her enough help.
Father Coyne said he is in touch with the health services himself about issues arising from Ms Dwyer's death and that he feels he should not discuss the matter with the media.
The local community is now trying to raise money to pay for her funeral and for her father's funeral.
The Eastern Health Board issued the following statement in response to a query from The Irish Times:
"The board deeply regrets the tragic death of the late Ms O'Dwyer.
"Ms O'Dwyer had been both an in patient and an out patient of St Loman's Hospital, Dublin, on a number of occasions since last August.
"She had been admitted to St Loman's, as a voluntary patient early in December. She was again admitted, as a voluntary patient, in the early hours of Christmas morning and at her own request, she was discharged from the hospital later on Christmas Day.
"She was subsequently seen each week at an out patient clinic, and in the interval visited frequently by health care workers and given the option of contacting St Loman's for assessment, and if necessary admission, at any time."