Jamey Carney, the US woman found murdered in her Killarney home, died as a result of suffocation, a postmortem has found.
Initial reports suggested the 43-year-old had been beaten to death, but The Irish Times has established that while she was the victim of an assault and suffered head injuries, State Pathologist Dr Linda Mulligan found suffocation was the cause of death.
Gardaí investigating the death of the mother-of-one are continuing to liaise with foreign police forces. They are trying to locate a suspect who fled the country within hours of the killing.
Gardaí now believe the man, who was known to Carney, boarded a flight at Dublin Airport for Turkey. It is believed he was on the flight before Carney’s body was discovered by a family member at the home she shared with her 13-year-old daughter at Homeland off the Muckross Road in Killarney.
READ MORE
Investigators believe the man caught an early-morning bus from Killarney to Dublin Airport on Tuesday and subsequently took a flight to Istanbul before gardaí were alerted, at about 1pm, to the murder.
Carney, who is Irish American, moved to Killarney from the US in 2021 with her daughter.
Gardaí have now requested assistance from both Europol and Interpol as they try to establish whether the man caught a connecting flight from Istanbul to another location in the Middle East or whether he is hiding out in Turkey.
If the suspect is located, it could still prove a significant challenge to have him extradited. This is because under Irish law, extradition to the Republic is only permitted when a person is sought to either serve a sentence or to be charged with an offence.
Irish law does not permit extradition for the purpose of investigation or questioning, so gardaí can only seek the extradition of the suspect in the Carney murder if they have received a direction from the Director of Public Prosecutions to charge him with an offence.
On RTÉ’s Prime Time on Thursday, Carney’s cousin Ryan Fox said she had been very proud of her Irish roots and “was looking for a beautiful country with like-minded people to raise her daughter”.
Speaking from New York, where she was from, he said she had “a heart of gold” and “worked as hard as she could to offer everything to her beautiful daughter”.
Carney’s mother and sister were now in Ireland “to deal with the authorities and to be with Jamey”, he said.
“She was taken from the people that love her and we’re all going to do everything in our power to make sure that this doesn’t happen to more people because nobody, nobody deserves this.”
He said he never received any communication that she feared for her safety and if he had, he “would have done whatever was in my power to protect her”. He appealed to people to “not use this to become bigoted or racist or prejudice in any way”.
The Garda investigation continued on Thursday, with technical experts continuing to carry out a forensic examination of Carney’s rented home in the hope of finding evidence that will assist them in linking the suspect to the crime.
However, a Garda source said this element of the investigation is complicated by the fact the man used to stay over regularly at Carney’s home. It is therefore likely that Garda technical experts will find his DNA at the house as a result of him being there legitimately, before the murder.
“It would be different if he was an intruder or had never been there before – he might be struggling to explain his DNA in that scenario,” said the source.
Because Carney was a US citizen and the suspect is from the Middle East with permission to remain permanently in the Republic, gardaí are concerned the killing may be seized upon by the US far-right and political figures intent on stirring racial tensions in the Republic.
Meanwhile, Garda technical experts are liaising with telecommunications companies and media platforms as they work to examine whether the man’s mobile phone activity can confirm his whereabouts at the time of the murder and his movements in the immediate aftermath.
Investigators have also begun examining CCTV harvested from various locations on the Muckross Road as well as other parts of Killarney. This is being done with a view to establishing the sequence of events leading up to the killing and the movements of the suspect as he fled the scene and made his way to Dublin.
Anyone who was in the Muckross Road area of Killarney between 11pm on July 6th and 5am on July 7th and who may have camera footage, including CCTV or dashcam, is asked to provide this footage to investigating gardaí.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Killarney Garda station on 064-6671160.
Carney was a third-generation Irish-American, originally from Westchester County, north of New York City. She had moved to here in May 2021 with her daughter and settled in Killarney, where she had previously holidayed.
It is believed that two of her grandparents were from Co Kerry.
Carney’s father died 11 months ago. Her mother and sister still live in the United States. She had worked in Tralee for RelateCare for the last 4½ years. A family liaison officer has been appointed to assist the family.
