Tag Archives: irish mirror

Tyler Murphy who died, aged 16, on August 29

Tyler Murphy, from Clonroche, Co Wexford, was 15 when he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in November 2018.

He died on Thursday, August 29, at the age of 16, at the home of his grandparents with whom he lived for the final eight years of his life.

He had the developmental age of a 10-year-old boy when he died.

Tyler’s family have told journalist Saoirse McGarrigle, of the Irish Mirror, that Tyler was refused palliative care in the days before he died despite medical records, seen by the newspaper, confirming the need for palliative care and “family support at end of life care” for Tyler.

Tyler’s great-aunt Frances Redmond told the Irish Mirror:

“We got him home that Tuesday [August 27].

“The family had to travel to Wexford Hospital to get his fill of oxygen because we had no palliative care in place.

“Tyler’s veins collapsed the Wednesday morning, so he wasn’t getting his morphine because there was nobody there to fix it.

“He was getting seizures and he was haemorrhaging, passing a lot of blood.

“Nurses came in and hooked up a morphine pump in the morning and that was it.

“I was told if Tyler is still alive on Saturday, somebody will come here Saturday morning and administer the morphine and no one will be back until the Monday morning.

“It would be a double dose set up on the Saturday morning, but that would have to last until Monday.”

“… Mag [Tyler’s grandmother] was at first informed palliative care was in place and nurses would be available at her disposal when she needed them.

“But then we were informed there was no palliative care, because he was classified as an adult at the age of 16, but with his body weight he would still be seen by paeds.”

Heartbroken Wexford family slam HSE for not providing palliative care to terminally ill son (Saoirse McGarrigle, The Irish Mirror)

From top: Brother John Gibson in the 1970s; Gibson in today’s Irish Mirror; A tweet last night from Saoirse McGarrigle, who first reported about Gibson in The Wexford Echo

Christian Brother John Gibson was convicted yesterday of sexually assaulting two children in the 1980s at a CBS school in Wexford.

Journalist Saoirse McGarrigle writes:

Last Tuesday Judge Elma Sheahan imposed a blanket ban on all reporting of the trial.

There was no reason given for this application for reporting restrictions on behalf of the DPP.

I called the Irish Mirror lawyer and argued the case for challenging these restrictions and he subsequently contacted lawyers for the Irish Times and Irish Independent.

They made a joint submission on Thursday and yesterday Judge Sheahan lifted the restrictions – meaning we could now name him and use photographs.

Last week we could not report that a trial was even taking place, let alone name the defendant!

The background to this case is that I interviewed a man (now deceased) while working for the Wexford Echo, who told me that he had been abused by Brother Gibson.

He then made a report to gardai and we ran the story that allegations had been made against “A Christian Brother” (no name) and detailed the nature of the claims (ie: that abuse happened after kids were asked to do odd jobs around the school and Gibson would insist on washing them.) The story resonated with others who contacted me and subsequently went to Gardai.

On Monday the trial began – based on three charges, two victims.

The significance of the reporting restrictions was that this story began with local investigative journalism.

At the culmination and conviction yesterday, it needed to be reported in national media. It was a story that needed to be told.

Getting the restrictions overturned yesterday was a huge win for press freedom and of course the victims who deserved publicity of the conviction after a long five year wait from time the story first broke and they made reports.

In fairness.

Christian Brother John Gibson found guilty of sexually abusing two children in Co Wexford (Saoirse McGarrigle, The Irish Mirror)

Previously: Christian Brothers Stories