‘We hope that justice is done’, say the relatives of mum hit by getaway car
HIT-AND-RUN victim Jacqueline McGovern was generous when it came to sharing her love. She left her grieving family in no doubt that she loved them deeply.
Out for a walk with her friend Audrey Behan last Tuesday night, she was cut down by a getaway car fleeing the scene of a robbery.
Three men in the car walked away and abandoned her.
“They took the love of our lives away,” said her husband Brendan.
“She was my soulmate,” he said.
She shared her love with the many children she helped as a special needs assistant in the local girls’ primary school.
Her family gathered at her home on Churchview Road, Killiney, Co Dublin, last Friday evening and told the Sunday Independent about the love and compassion that ‘Jackie’ had in abundance.
“For 36 years we lived our dream together. Jackie was an absolutely gorgeous woman,” said Brendan, fighting back tears.
Brendan (55) had rushed to the scene of the hit-and-run on nearby Avondale Road in Killiney and arrived as paramedics worked hard on the roadside to save her.
His 54-year-old was pronounced dead less than an hour later in Saint Vincent’s Hospital.
The injuries suffered by her close friend Audrey (51) were fortunately not life-threatening.
Jackie’s family gained some comfort and relief that Audrey was able to be discharged home.
Gardai are continuing their investigation of the shocking events. The three men who fled the crash scene had used a knife to threaten staff in a hold-up at the Centra shop in Barnhill Road in nearby Dalkey.
Their out-of-control getaway car mounted a footpath on Avondale Road and struck the women. The two local women regularly took hourlong exercise walks together.
In Jackie’s family home last Friday, Brendan and their three children Oisin (28), Cormac
(24) and Clodagh (21) sat together with Jackie’s parents Paul and Margo Walsh from nearby Glasthule and they paid tribute to the woman that united them all in her generous love.
Jackie grew up in Glasthule with siblings Frankie, Christina and Damien. She was like a second mother to Damien as she was 16 years older than him.
She attended Harold’s Convent primary school in Glasthule and the Holy Child secondary school in Sallynoggin. She worked in Quinnsworth’s head office in Dun Laoghaire and later qualified as a special needs assistant for primary schools.
Her husband Brendan is chairman of Dun Laoghaire Historical Society. He grew up in Rockford Park, Blackrock. Brendan was apprenticed at 14 to Jackie’s father Paul, who was a plumber. Paul, in turn, worked for Brendan’s father Micheal McGovern who had a busy plumbing business in Dun Laoghaire.
The story of how Brendan and Jackie embarked on a lifetime of love is treasured by all the family. As a young apprentice Brendan was often brought home by Paul for tea. “Jackie fancied me, unbeknown to me at the time,” said Brendan with a smile.
The family story goes that, one night, as teenagers, they met by chance in The Leslie Inn on the top floor of Dun Laoghaire Shopping Centre. When Brendan asked her why she was there, she told him she had a date but she had been stood up.
Brendan asked Jackie about the guy who stood her up: “How did he get a date?” “He asked me.”
“If I was to ask you, what would you say?”
“I don’t know, you’d have to ask me.”
They were to spend the next 36 years together. At the ages of 22 and 23, they bought their home in Churchview Road. “She was the love of my life,” said Brendan.
Clodagh said: “Mum and Dad showed us the meaning of love. How to be treated and how not to be treated. All Mum wanted was to help people. She was a mum to everybody. She never put herself first.”
She recalled how her mother ensured there were hot water bottles in the family’s beds. Cormac said how “everyone knew she made great Victoria Sandwich cake”.
Oisin agreed that his mother thought a lot about the well-being of others. She was “a brilliant mother who raised us well… We all lived the best life we could ever live under this roof. We were absolutely blessed.”
Margo (75) said her daughter loved the children she helped as a special needs assistant at Our Lady of Good Counsel Girls’ National School and had spent many years helping children who had autism.
“Those children loved her. She was very thoughtful and she did everything to make the children happy,” she said.
Jackie enjoyed yoga, Pilates, aqua aerobics, and long walks with her friend Audrey.
Brendan said it was Audrey’s husband Colin who telephoned him with the devastating news of what happened last Tuesday night.
Brendan, visibly moved, said: “I drove up, parked on the roundabout, and I ran up. I could see she was being worked on at the scene. I was told to stay back. When I saw the car, I knew she was not going to make it.”
He said Colin told him that the women were walking home when they heard a noise. Before Audrey could turn around, all she heard was Jackie calling ‘Audrey!’ And then the impact.
Brendan draws comfort from the special moments that Jackie enjoyed in the weeks before her death. She had spent a fun-filled weekend with her sister Christina in
London last month to mark Christina’s 50th. Last weekend, Brendan and Jackie and Colin and Audrey enjoyed a night out in Dun Laoghaire.
Brendan was aware how much local people enjoyed Jackie’s company. He said: “She was a great talker but she listened. She really listened.”
He said she had a great sense of humour and fun. She could josh him for his role as chairman of Dun Laoghaire Historical Society — “or, as Jackie would call it, the Dun Laoghaire Hysterical Society”.
Her loss is a heavy blow to all her loved ones. Her mother said: “Life will never be the same again.”
Her father Paul (76) said: “She was an angel. Half my heart is gone with her.”
Brendan said: “They took the love of our lives away. We hope that justice is done.”
The three suspects in the crime are from the Ballybrack, Sallynoggin and Monkstown areas. The trio, all young men in their early 20s, are known to gardai for involvement in crime. Three men were in the speeding car after they carried out a robbery at the Centra shop, Barnhill Stores on Barnhill Road in Dalkey, minutes before the fatal crash.
Jackie’s requiem mass will be at 10am on Wednesday at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church, Johnstown, Co Dublin, and people are requested to wear colourful clothes.
‘Brendan draws comfort from the special moments Jackie enjoyed’ ‘She was very thoughtful and did everything to make the children happy’