WHEN THE bodies of a young mother and her two daughters were pulled from a flaming house on Christmas morning it was initially believed they had died in a tragic house fire, possibly caused by faulty Christmas lights.
However, as the investigation into the deaths of Sharon Whelan (30) and her daughters Zara (7) and Nadia (2) progressed, a sinister picture of murder and arson began to emerge.
Zara and Nadia had been put to bed the night before and their grandfather Christy, Ms Whelan's father, had visited the house while they slept, leaving wrapped presents for the next morning.
The first indication that anything was wrong came when neighbours spotted smoke and flames billowing from the roof and windows of the old farmhouse at Roscon, near Windgap, Co Kilkenny, at about 8.30am on Christmas morning.
Within minutes a group of neighbours had gathered at the rented house and broke in to rescue anyone inside.
The house was filled with thick smoke and all three bodies were discovered in a downstairs bedroom to the rear of the house.
Emergency services arrived moments later and part of the roof had collapsed before fire fighters were able to put out the blaze.
Neighbours had first believed that Christmas lights rigged up outside the back of the house, but plugged in through a window, may have been the cause of the fire.
An Aga stove, which was used to heat the house, was also sent to Garda headquarters in Dublin and examined as a possible cause of the fire.
As the small and tight-knit rural community came to terms with events, gardaí and the State Pathologist's office were carrying out intensive forensic examinations.
A postmortem confirmed that Zara and Nadia had died from smoke inhalation.
However, no smoke was discovered in the lungs of their mother.
The house, at the end of a laneway, three kilometres from the small village of Windgap, remained sealed off for almost two weeks as gardaí continued their investigations. Ms Whelan's body was examined at Waterford Regional Hospital and ligature marks were found on her neck suggesting she may have been strangled.Garda investigations continued as detectives interviewed almost 300 people and took DNA samples and fingerprints from individuals known to be close to Ms Whelan.
On January 15th, a man was arrested in connection with the fire at the house.
Two days later, postal worker Brian Hennessy appeared before a special sitting of Kilkenny District Court charged with the murder of Sharon Whelan.