As a journalist, Saoirse McGarrigle covered the disappearance of Jo Jo Dullard for years. She got to know the Kilkenny woman’s family and writes today about how Mary Phelan, Jo Jo’s sister, would have received this week’s news of a search and arrest.
A PERSON ARRESTED in relation to the disappearance of Jo Jo Dullard this week is the same man that Mary Phelan suspected had abducted, raped and murdered her little sister.
Mary was most well-known for being Jo Jo’s older sister; a slim woman with fair hair and a solemn expression who was frequently photographed holding a picture of her missing sister.
But while Mary was every bit the soft-spoken grieving sister, she was also a force of nature full of fight.
The last time I saw Mary was just hours before she passed away from cancer in 2018. Despite her weakened state, she still had the strength to urge those at her bedside to never give up looking for her sister. She died with a photo of Jo Jo at her side.
This plea for a continued pursuit of justice was echoed by the priest at her funeral in her local Cuffesgrange church, in County Kilkenny, that was packed not just with family and friends, but with strangers who had admired her strength from afar.
After the funeral service, mourners gathered at a nearby hotel – the same one where she had celebrated her marriage to Martin Phelan decades earlier.
I met a woman in the bathroom who told me that she had never even met Mary before, but she had come to show her respect to a woman that she described as a powerhouse and advocate for victims of crime.
It’s now more than five years since I have written about Jo Jo Dullard.
I would spot the annual appeals for information on the anniversary of her disappearance and scoff: “Another year…and no news”.
Mary believed that there were many elements to her sister’s case that had never been told.
The man who last saw Jo Jo alive was never named publicly, but we did report that he came from a well-known family.
In an information vacuum, rumours fill the space. The most common mistake made about Jo Jo’s case was a false connection with rapist Larry Murphy. Mary insisted that Murphy was not, and never would be, a viable suspect in her sister’s case.
Instead, she suspected that the man arrested this week may have had some involvement in Jo Jo’s disappearance. Despite her limited means, she paid for a private investigator to go onto his land posing as a lost tourist looking for directions – just to get a photograph him.
A copy of that investigator’s report, which she shared with me almost eight years ago, recorded this encounter: “I also saw a man working… I got out of my vehicle to ask directions… I was met by a dark-haired man who was very polite, very helpful and wrote out the directions for me on a piece of cardboard. As this was taking place, another man appeared from the top of the yard and shouted, “Are you in trouble there…?”
“[X] replied: ‘Not at all… they’re lost, just giving directions.’ I then walked up to X to chat. As I approached him. He placed the shovel he was holding over his right shoulder. He was quite hostile and gave me a cold reception.”
After Jo Jo’s disappearance, Mary received a letter from a woman who claimed to have known of the suspect.
Mary recalled its contents, depicting the man as a vile thug capable of murder: “I’ll always remember that letter, she said that you wouldn’t want to know what type of man he is – he is not a man you would like to know or meet”.
The writer never signed her name to the correspondence and the family appealed for her to contact them again – but she never did.
Jo Jo was dubbed “the girl in the phone box” and her family was devastated when this marker on the side of the road was torn down.
In the same way that family members of those that die in a car crash leave flowers at a roadside, Mary and her husband Martin saw the phone box as a significant memorial to their missing Jo Jo.
When it was removed a women’s advocacy group donated money to fund a stone memorial to remember her.
Mary remembered her sister as being a “quiet girl” who had been a trainee beauty therapist who had held down multiple jobs. She was renting an apartment in Callan, County Kilkenny, and finding her feet after a difficult start in life. Their father had died before Jo Jo was born and their mother passed away from cancer while she was still a child.
Mary and their other sister Kathleen Bergin had cared for Jo Jo growing up.
There is a distance that a reporter must keep when reporting a story, particularly one involving such grief and anger. But there are also individuals that you meet along the way who make an impression.
They are the people whose phone calls you answer late in the evening and even on your day off – not because you expect that they are going to give you an explosive tip that needs to be published immediately but because you are simply in awe of their energy. Mary Phelan was that type of person.
A cup of tea before bedtime was one of her simple pleasures. That quiet time in the evening was when she felt most at peace.
In an era where WhatsApp is many people’s preferred mode of communication, Mary would write cards and send gifts in the post.
While her frustration with the lack of progress in Jo Jo’s case could boil over at times, she would remain composed and driven. I only once saw fear in her eyes. It was when I mentioned that I planned to doorstep the suspect at his rural home to try to get him to talk to me about the case. She was adamant that I should not do this.
It was my job to report on stories, so of course it was my choice to go or not, but there was wisdom in her often sad eyes that I respected.
Truthfully, the only people that she really wanted to show up at his door was a garda with a search warrant.
When I heard yesterday that this day had come, my first thought was just how happy Mary would be if she were alive to see this happen. But after a few hours passed, I changed my mind.
If Mary were alive today, I don’t think that she would find comfort in knowing that this man had finally been arrested. It would simply have fuelled her fight. This week’s arrest and search would mean little to Mary if it doesn’t lead to Jo Jo being brought home.
No person has been charged with the abduction or murder of Jo Jo Dullard. The Garda investigation is continuing.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say