Family and Garda make a new appeal on missing woman

Two years after she disappeared from her home in Wexford, the Garda and the family of Fiona Sinnott have issued a renewed appeal for anyone with knowledge of her fate to come forward.

They remain convinced that there is someone with at least indirect knowledge of why the 19-year-old went missing without trace, leaving behind a baby daughter, after a night out with friends in her local pub.

The Garda investigation into Ms Sinnott's disappearance was one of the most intensive conducted in the county, but has drawn only blanks.

"It's just like she vanished,", her sister, Caroline, reflects. "But you don't just vanish into thin air. There's somebody out there who knows something. Somebody who has it on their conscience, if they have a conscience."

A garda closely involved in the ongoing investigation into Ms Sinnott's disappearance agrees. "I believe that somebody knows something about it," said Sgt Paddy Carley of Rosslare. "It is not too late to come forward and any information will be treated in the strictest confidence."

The last person known to have seen Ms Sinnott alive is her ex-boyfriend, Mr Sean Carroll, the father of her daughter, Emma.

On Sunday, February 8th, both were drinking in Butler's pub in Broadway, near Rosslare, but not in the same company. Fiona was in good form, "just having a laugh around the table" with friends, said Caroline.

As she was leaving, she was joined by Mr Carroll at the door and the two left the pub together. Although they were no longer going out together, they had continued to see each other socially.

Mr Carroll has told gardai he spent the Sunday night at Ms Sinnott's rented cottage in the townland of Ballycushlane, where she lived alone. When he left the following morning, February 9th, she was still in the house.

There has been no sighting of Ms Sinnott since. An exhaustive search continued for months afterwards, matching the intensity of a murder investigation, said Supt Jim Kehoe of Wexford. Fields, ponds and marl holes were checked and, in a major operation, Our Lady's Island lake was drained. Family members also put up hundreds of posters in the area and beyond.

Last year detectives involved in Operation Trace, the Garda investigation into the cases of six missing women, came to Wexford but also failed to turn up any new leads. Gardai are now satisfied there is no link between Ms Sinnott's case and the others.

While there is always "that little bit of hope", Caroline says she has accepted Fiona is no longer alive. "The sister I know wouldn't have done that without contacting anyone. No way." Her parents, Pat and Mary, who live in the village of Bridgetown, are doing remarkably well considering what they've been through, she says.

Their anguish has been compounded by limitations on their access to their granddaughter, Emma, whom they meet for an hour every fortnight in a local hotel. Emma is being cared for by Sean Carroll's parents at their home in Coddstown, Killinick, and the question of access is the subject of legal proceedings between the two families.

Caroline says she sees Emma, who will be three on March 1st, only on the odd occasion when they accidentally meet. "She's happy as Larry and they're [the Carrolls] very good to her, but she's also my sister's daughter . . . I want her to know that she had a mother and who she was and what she was like."

It was Ms Sinnott's failure to turn up for Emma's first birthday which convinced her family something serious was wrong.

She had previously gone missing for a short period, before Emma was born, so concern about her welfare was not initially as high as it might otherwise have been. Her disappearance was not reported to the Garda until February 18th, 10 days after she left Butler's pub with Mr Carroll.

Mr Carroll was not available to speak to The Irish Times. His father, Mr Sean Carroll snr, said he had "nothing to say".

Last September, Ms Sinnott, the youngest of five brothers and sisters, would have celebrated her 21st birthday. To mark the occasion her family attended a remembrance Mass.

Fiona was a "normal 19-year-old girl, into socialising and having a laugh," said Caroline. "You do survive, you carry on for the sake of others, but it's always there at the back of your mind, you want to know what happened."

Anyone with information is asked to contact Wexford Garda station at 053-22333.