Jillian’s family’s relief now they know what her killer looks like
THE FAMILY of the late Jillian Bishop have expressed relief that they have seen a photograph of the man who murdered her in 1991.
Bray man Michael McLaughlin killed Jill when she was 18 and on her way home from a Halloween disco in the Bray Head.
He was released last July and his victim’s family said at the time that they did not know what he looked like.
Last week, the Sunday World captured a photo of McLaughlin.
Jill’s younger sister Karen and some friends were with her on the night of her death, but were walking ahead of her.
Her body was found in a seafront garden the following day. A boy went into the garden after a ball and discovered the remains.
McLaughlin, now aged 50, had beaten Jill and forced a £1 coin down her throat.
Karen, her parents Ciaran and May and brother John had been told they couldn’t have a photograph of McLaughlin, under the Data Protection Act.
‘Dad had been down to the gardaí in Bray,’ said Karen. ‘At least now we can say we did something. It is a relief now.
‘I find myself looking at the photo, wondering why did you do it? How could you do it?,’ she said. ‘He’s still as evil now as he was 27 years ago.’
Karen said that conditions of McLaughlin’s release included staying out of Bray.
‘How could that happen if nobody knows what he looks like?’ she said. ‘It felt like he was protected all the time but we were open targets.’
She said that the experience up to getting the photo has been like ‘reliving the whole thing all over again’, but that it was important to know what he looks like.
‘It was necessary,’ said Karen. ‘A murderer should not be protected. The victims should be. His life sentence has ended but ours continues.’
The trauma of her sister’s killing has had a devastating effect on Karen. She was just 16 years old and attending her first disco on the night her sister died. Just 24 hours later, she was being brought in to identify Jillian’s clothes. ‘You’re a child one minute then facing something like that,’ said Karen.
She said that she and her parents feel more at ease now that the picture of McLaughlin is out there.
‘We had to fight for everything. At times it was like beating our heads against a brick wall.
‘ The trauma continues and will never go away,’ said Karen. ‘But you have to try to get on with it each day and put your best side out.’