Detectives investigating the murder a week ago of Raonaid Murray in south Dublin yesterday put together a photofit likeness of a man they wish to interview. Last night gardai were still waiting to hear from the man, who was seen acting suspiciously around the time of the fatal stabbing.
The man took a taxi from the centre of Dun Laoghaire to an address in Granville Road in Blackrock. The driver noticed what appeared to be blood on his trousers.
The man first directed the driver to Avondale Road, Blackrock, and then to Granville Road, where he pointed to a house. The driver noticed the man walking to the front door, activating security lights and an alarm. The taxi-driver turned and drove past the house again but the man had gone.
Gardai carried out house-to-house inquiries at both addresses in Blackrock, and nobody answering the man's description is known to live there.
Det Supt Martin Donnellan, of Dun Laoghaire Garda station, said: "This man was in his mid-20s. He was about 5 9["] tall and he wore light-coloured clothing.
"We have carried out extensive house-to-house inquiries in the Granville area of Blackrock and we have failed to identify this man. He had what appeared to be bloodstains on his trousers. We're most anxious to speak to him to eliminate him, if possible, from this inquiry".
The officer in charge of the investigation, Chief Supt Pat Culhane, yesterday directed all his available gardai to carry out a "sweep" of the Dun Laoghaire and Glenageary areas in an attempt to get new information about Ms Murray's last movements.
Plainclothes and uniformed officers toured the town centre last night distributing the photofit image of the man in the taxi. They also stopped drivers and pedestrians to ask if they had seen her any time last Friday night.
Detectives investigating the murder have already taken more than 600 statements and are seeking any new witnesses who might have noticed anything suspicious in the general area last Friday night.
Ms Murray was last seen at 12.02 a.m. at the junction of Glenageary Road and Corrig Road last Saturday. Her body was found close to her home in Silchester Park in Glenageary. She had been stabbed repeatedly with a large knife and died a short time later.