‘Santina’s deluded killer is wasting everyone’s time...’
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THE father of murdered Santina Cawley has slammed her killer as “deluded,” as she appealed her conviction this week.
Karen Harrington, who is serving a life sentence for the murder of the two-year-old in Cork city in 2019, appeared before a sitting of the Court of Appeal on Monday arguing that CCTV footage captured inside her home amounted to a breach of her privacy rights.
And in an exclusive interview with this paper as the judges now consider Harrington’s appeal, Santina’s devastated father Michael said he believed the murderer’s bid for freedom to be “a waste of everyone’s time”.
He added: “I don’t like the fact that they’re using another case in the EU that has nothing to do with my daughter. It should never have been brought up.
“The only thing the EU should do is bring back the death penalty for the likes of Karen Harrington and stop her wasting the government’s time, the judges’ time and our time wrecking our heads with this.
“We’re sick of it. We just want to move forward with our lives and learn to live with what’s after happening to Santina.”
On Monday Harrington’s defence argued that CCTV taken from an address that backed on to her duplex amounted to a breach of her right to privacy and should not have been put before a jury.
But for Michael, who was once in a relationship with Harrington and entrusted her to mind his child on the night she killed her, her appeal is “a weak argument”.
He added: “It’s a good job they put the cameras there. They caught her out and helped prove she was guilty.
“Cameras are there and they’re built into complexes and when the guards ask for CCTV from anywhere, be it from businesses, apartments, lorries, they get it.”
Michael was briefly present in court for Harrington’s appeal, but says he couldn’t face her for too long and left.
He said: “I went but I didn’t wait around too long. It just brings back a lot, it really does.
“It was very upsetting. Karen is just a very deluded person. It’s a very weak case. It’s such a stupid thing she’s asking the judges to consider.
“She’s dragging the whole case back up again with her stupid arguments. She doesn’t have enough grounds for an appeal. It’s a joke.
“She’s after murdering my child and she got the same evidence she got the first time when she was convicted.”
Michael says he hopes the judges come to a decision quickly and that he and his family can start to move on from the tragedy.
He also doesn’t want his daughter to just be remembered for the horror that was visited upon her.
He added: “I just want my little girl to rest. I don’t want my daughter to be remembered as this child murdered.
“She was a beautiful baby and loveable child and we were always so happy she was in our lives.
“We were so lucky to have her in our lives. I want her to be remembered as more than just a murder victim.”
The heartbroken father also said he doesn’t want the apartment where his daughter was murdered to ever be opened up to another family again, adding: “I would like the apartment to be locked forever by the council. It’s a broken home and no one should ever live there again.”
In May 2022 Harrington was convicted by a jury of Santina’s murder.
The trial heard that Michael had left Santina in Harrington’s care in her apartment when he went into Cork City in the early hours of July 5, 2019, to try and find his cousin who had come from Limerick.
During the trial, the jury heard evidence that Santina suffered a total of 53 separate injuries and
Assistant State Pathologist Dr Margaret Bolster told the trial that her injuries could not have been accidental such was their multiplicity and ubiquity all over her body.
Dr Bolster told the trial that Santina, who was just 47cm tall and weighed 10.3kg, died from traumatic brain injury and upper spinal cord injury together with polytrauma and lower limb injuries, all a result of blunt force trauma.
At the Court of Appeal Jane Hyland SC, for Harrington, said that “the trial judge erred in law in admitting into evidence CCTV footage from Clanrickarde Estate”. She added: “The appellant submits that the said footage was highly prejudicial and that its prejudicial effect far outweighed its probative value at the trial.
“It is submitted that the footage invaded the appellant’s right to privacy together with the inviolability of her dwelling under the Irish Constitution by capturing not only the exterior of her dwelling but the interior also.”
Ms Justice Isobel Kennedy, sitting with Ms Justice Una Ni Raifeartaigh and Ms Justice Tara Burns said the court would reserve its judgement.
We were always so happy she was in our lives MICHAEL CAWLEY YESTERDAY