PEOPLE IN the courtroom cried, bowed their heads or closed their eyes as the desperate last words of Caroline McElhill were heard at the inquest into the deaths of the seven members of the McElhill family at Omagh Court House yesterday.
Harrowing and distressing hardly captures the atmosphere as the audio recording of the 999 call 13-year-old Caroline made to the emergency services almost two years ago was played in the courtroom.
As police recalled after the fire early in the morning of November 13th, 2007, Caroline was found clutching a rosary beads and the telephone. She had bravely tried to save her family and herself.
With her were her brothers and sisters – Seán aged seven, Bellina aged four, Clodagh 19 months and James 10 months – and their parents Lorraine McGovern, aged 29, and 36-year-old Arthur McElhill.
With a record of two sexual assaults against young teenage girls and a history of depression that included one reported suicide attempt, Arthur McElhill is suspected of deliberately starting the fire that wiped out the family.
Before the inquest began coroner Suzanne Anderson brought the McElhill and McGovern relatives into the courtroom away from the public and the press so they could be prepared for what everyone knew would be the most disturbing part of the evidence – Caroline’s last phone call.
The two families sat apart, at opposite sides of the courtroom, when later that morning Prof Peter French, a phonetics and acoustics expert from York University, was called to give evidence about the phone call.
Caroline was heard telling the operator, “Help me”. The operator asks her what service she wanted. “Fire service, please,” Caroline seemed to say.
She managed to say that the fire was in Lammy Crescent in Omagh. Just before that she said, “I am burning . . .” and then it became inaudible.
“Help,” she cried again as the interchange continued with the operator. “Ah . . . he’s . . . k . . .” Caroline added.
Prof French said by various means including voice enhancement he tried to fully decipher what she said in that short sentence, as to what the “k” or “kuh” sound meant, but he couldn’t do it.
There followed another cry for “help” from Caroline and then a scream and a little later the sound of breaking glass. There are the sounds of gasps as well.
In the next three or four minutes the operator is heard repeating, “hello?, hello?, hello? Can anybody hear me?” The sounds of the flames in the background can be heard, but no more words from the 13-year-old.