We felt humiliated to be singled out by investigations
ON Monday, September 24, Valentia Islanders were taken by surprise with the arrival of a considerable number of Gardaí Siochána to the area, accompanied by a number of journalists from the national media.
Rarely, if ever, have so many Gardaí been observed in the area at any one time. It was all to do with the ongoing investigations into the well-documented Kerry Baby case.
The dead baby was discovered washed up on the White Strand of Over-The-Water in Cahirsiveen in 1984, and it remains an unsolved case.
Over the course of a few days, door-to-door interviews were carried out. The Garda decision to focus on Valentia was due to its proximity to the White Strand, and the theory that the baby could have been washed ashore by tides from the Valentia direction (a number of experienced seafaring Valentia Islanders have interesting observations on this).
The Gardaí also went on the fact that Valentia had a larger population in 1984.
In view of the fact that the body was discovered on the White Strand well across the sea from Valentia Island and in mainland Iveragh, many Valentia Islanders were perplexed and aggrieved that such a small, close-knit community of seven miles by three was singled out and honed in on in such a fashion for such close Garda scrutiny and basically humiliated by simultaneous national media reporting.
They are by no means being parochial and against Valentia Islanders being questioned by Gardaí on the tragedy, but they feel it should have been carried out in the broader context of the surrounding Iveragh area.
However, they were accommodating, courteous and friendly to the Gardaí Síochána in their door-to-door endeavours.
They respected them for the job they had to do and were also cognisant of the fact that most of these Gardaí were very young or not even born back in 1984 , the year in which the investigation first began.