Grieving family must get answers they seek

NO-ONE who watched Claire Byrne’s RTÉ interview with Clodagh Hawe’s mother and sister on Monday night, or, indeed, who read the full transcript in this newspaper yesterday, will ever forget the horrendous details relating to the murder of Clodagh and her three young sons.

Yet, despite all we know about the appalling and violent act perpetrated by Alan Hawe on his wife and children, and despite the obvious anguish of Clodagh’s relatives – and, indeed, their courage in speaking out – it is nonetheless very clear that this grieving family has been deprived of vital information that could help them to better understand why this horror was visited upon their loved ones.

The family believe that the activities surrounding Alan Hawe’s behaviour in the school where he was vice-principal lie at the heart of this act of unspeakable violence, that this was, indeed, the actual trigger for this tragedy.

Surely, therefore, they have a right to know the precise nature of those activities – what they were, who knew about them, and what was going to be done in relation to Mr Hawe’s behaviour.

It is clear from the family’s perspective that the inquest process failed to provide them with answers, leaving them still in the dark about so many aspects of this terrible tragedy.

Yet, the point of an inquest is, in part at least, to allow bereaved families to understand not just what happened, but why it occurred.

And in a murder-suicide scenario such as this, with no-one left behind, there is even more necessity for clarity. For there is no prospect, after all, of any civil or criminal process which could, in other circumstances, throw more light on the whys and the wherefores of the case.

Clodagh Hawe’s family have a right to know why their loved ones died. However, the inquest did not deliver what they require.

It’s time, therefore, that, within the constraints of the Constitution, they are given the information that is their due.