Gardaí have issued a renewed appeal for a potentially key witness to come forward who may help to find the killers of teenager Raonaid Murray.
Murray (17) was last seen alive at about 11.20pm on Friday, September 3rd, 1999, when she made her way home from Dún Laoghaire town centre.
She had been socialising with a friend of hers before walking what would have been a 15-minute journey to her home.
She never made it and her body was found at Silchester Crescent, Glenageary, at 12.33am the next day, a short distance from her home.
She had been stabbed four times with a sharp knife. Despite her injuries, she managed to stumble towards her home before collapsing. She later died from her injuries.
Gardaí have taken 4,500 witness statements in the intervening years. Twelve suspects were arrested and released without charge, but the motivation for the murder has never been established.
In their renewed appeal, gardaí called on a witness who may have given an alibi for the suspected killer to come forward. “You may be unknowingly shielding a killer,” they said.
At the time of the original investigation, an eyewitness came forward to state she had seen a young man who appeared to be pestering a woman who matched the description of Murray at the top of Corrig Avenue, but nothing came of that lead.
Because of the Garda investigation, an inquest into her death was not carried out until 2013. A jury at the Dublin Coroner’s Court returned a verdict of unlawful killing.
The postmortem found she had died following shock and blood loss due to a stab wound in the left armpit.
Her family have never given up hope of finding her killer and renew their annual appeal every year. A Garda statement said the force was still attempting to solve the case.
Many of those who were the same age as Murray then are parents now. “We would ask them to reflect now with the benefit of maturity and hindsight on any information that may be of assistance to the investigation,” said the force.
“The solving of this murder is of the utmost priority for An Garda Síochána and any information received will be treated with absolute confidentiality.”