House ‘resembled a massacre scene’ as woman injured
A HOUSE where a mother-offour suffered a catastrophic head injury in an alleged incident resembled the scene of a massacre, according to a source close to the victim.
Christina Leslie (28) was last night in a critical condition in Beaumont Hospital in Dublin having had to have a section of her skull removed by surgeons after the alleged incident at her home in Rathmullan Park in Drogheda, Co Louth, on Friday.
Gardaí have sealed off the house and declared it a crime scene.
Ms Leslie was brought by ambulance to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda on Friday morning after emergency services were called to the scene in the Co Louth town.
But she was later transferred to Beaumont Hospital in Dublin and had two emergency surgeries to relieve the pressure on her swelling brain.
As gardaí continue to investigate the incident, a local source described the scene at the house as being “like a massacre”.
“There was blood in the bedroom and on the stairs. The bed was bloodstained too,” they told the Irish Independent.
Gardaí are now anxious to talk to a man, who is known to Ms Leslie, about the sequence of events prior to the emergency services being called to the house.
Her parents are now looking after her four children while they await news from medics on her condition.
They are being supported by neighbours and friends in the tight-knit local community.
Garda Superintendent Andrew Watters confirmed an incident room has been set up in Drogheda garda station and gardaí are trying to establish how Ms Leslie got the head injury.
They are understood to be following a definite line of inquiry into the situation which has left her on a life support machine in hospital.
Yesterday members of the Garda Technical Bureau spent hours examining the end-of-terrace house for forensic evidence to be used in the ongoing investigation.
They removed a number of items from the house and spent a lot of time examining the stairs and the hallway at the bottom of the stairs.
One of the items removed was a small samurai sword, but each item will have to undergo forensic analysis to determine if it is relevant or not in the Garda inquiry.
The curtains were drawn in the house, and gardaí could be seen carrying out work at both the front and rear of the property which backs onto a small laneway.
No arrests have been made yet in connection with the incident.
Locals said Ms Leslie had lived at the house for a number of years and was well known in the area.