ON THE NIGHT of 13 February 1981, 48 young people went out to the Stardust nightclub in Artane and never came home.
A fire engulfed the nightclub where hundreds of revellers had gathered. Many of the exits were chained closed and windows were blocked by iron bars.
While many people escaped, 48 others died, leaving parents, siblings, children friends and families bereft. This week, a jury at an inquest returned a verdict of unlawful killing for those who had lost their lives.
While it was a vindication of the victims and their families, it has been a long and winding road to to get to this point. Two inquests, one Tribunal of Inquiry, a compensation tribunal, and a number of investigations and reports, as well as countless hours spent campaigning, have led here.
At the time of the fire, Charlie Haughey was Taoiseach as well as a local TD in the area. Keen to be seen to act swiftly, a tribunal of inquiry was established within days of the blaze.
The Keane Tribunal delved into the fire in huge detail, working through a huge amount of testimony and eyewitness accounts and examining many facets of what led to the fire.
The tribunal was highly critical of the safety measures at the nightclub, and criticised the dangerous safety practices in place. However, after 122 days, Mr Justice Ronan Keane concluded in his 1982 findings that the blaze was caused by ‘probable arson’ rather than an accident.
This finding devastated the relatives of those who lost their lives and those injured in the blaze. Stardust manager and owner Eamon Butterly was allowed to claim £580,000 compensation for “malicious damage” from the state.
The families and survivors were devastated following the Tribunal, but continued to advocate for justice.
A second tribunal – the Victims Compensation Tribunal – was held in 1986 in order to group together a number of claims that had been brought in relation to the blaze.
The tribunal – chaired by Mr Justice Donal Barrington – laid out in detail the horrific injuries and causes of death for the 48 who died in the place, as well as the devastation to the families, survivors and the local community.
“We were struck by the devastation which the tragedy appeared to have caused to a local community,” the Tribunal concluded.
Nevertheless, following the Tribunal the Government was keen to draw a line under the matter and consider it closed. The families were left with no closure and deep anger and hurt over the findings of the first Tribunal and their treatment by the State.
The families kept fighting.
John Keegan, whose daughters Martina and Mary died in the blaze, set up the Stardust Victims’ Committee in 1985. Keegan died in 1986, the same day he lost a Supreme Court case for personal injuries following the deaths of his daughters.
But the group continued to campaign for a new inquiry for decades.
An independent report by Geraldine Foy, a researcher for the Stardust families, was handed to the Department of Justice in 2003 that contained expert evidence disputing the original tribunal’s findings.
Years later, in 2008, the government commissioned an independent examination of new evidence, chaired by Paul Coffey SC. The investigation also did not lead to a definitive ruling on the fire’s cause.
However, Coffey said that the original verdict from the 1981 Tribunal – that the fire was likely caused by arson – was in grave doubt.
The investigation recommended that the verdict of the 1981 tribunal be struck from the public record, a win for the families.
Later, the Government appointed retired judge Mr Justice Pat McCartan to examine potential new evidence into the circumstances surrounding the tragedy.
He was asked to make a recommendation on whether a commission of investigation into the fire was warranted. In November that year, Judge McCartan said in his report that no new investigation was warranted.
The report concludes:
“Having considered all the material evidence submitted to the committee there is no new or updated evidence disclosed in the meaning of the terms of this assessment and no new enquiry is warranted.”
Judge McCartan criticised the evidence presented to him. The families criticised the report as “rude and aggressive”.
In 2018, following more pressure, then-Taoiseach Leo Varadkar told the Dáil that the attorney general would look “afresh” at a request to hold a second inquest.
In March 2019, an application was made to the attorney general for fresh inquests. A 37-page submission was filed by Phoenix Law on behalf of Antoinette Keegan and relatives of 42 of the 48 people who died in the fire.
Finally, in September 2019, the then-attorney general Seamus Woulfe SC directed that fresh inquests should be held into the deaths.
He said at the time:
“This is because I consider that in the original inquests there was an insufficiency of inquiry as to how the deaths occurred, namely, a failure to sufficiently consider those of the surrounding circumstances that concern the cause or causes of the fire.”
The first hearings took place in April 2023. After over 43 years, countless hardships and work, this week a verdict of unlawful killing was returned by the jury for all 48 people who died in the disaster.
With reporting from Press Association
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