GARDAÍ HAVE pledged to work tirelessly to bring to justice those responsible for the “heinous” and “appalling” death of a Romanian teenager, who was abducted and killed just three weeks after arriving in Ireland.
The body of Marioara Rostas (18) was discovered wrapped in a plastic sheet in a shallow grave in a mountainous area at Kippure near Manor Kilbride, Co Wicklow, on Monday, after a 13-day search operation by a Garda team.
A postmortem confirmed that Ms Rostas – last seen alive on January 6th, 2008 – died as a result of a gunshot wound.
This was after she was accosted while begging on Lombard Street East in Dublin and taken away in a Ford Mondeo car, which has since been seized.
It is understood she was taken to a property on Brabazon Street in Dublin 8 – described as a key location in the context of the investigation – where she was held against her will for a number of days and sexually assaulted before being shot and buried.
A gangland criminal from Dublin’s south inner city is suspected of central involvement in the murder but gardaí have not discounted a theory that she was shot by another person, possibly a woman.
However, it was getting in to the male suspect’s silver Ford Mondeo car that she was last seen by her brother. It is also the male suspect who is believed to have driven her to the house in Brabazon Street where he held her against her will and attacked her before she was shot dead.
“Marioara was a harmless, defenceless young woman who was 18 years of age but she looked younger than that,” said Garda Chief Supt Michael O’Sullivan of the Dublin South Central Division.
“She was abducted in the south inner city of Dublin and brutalised and murdered for no apparent reason. I can say she suffered an appalling death and that is incomprehensible in a civilised society.
“We will work tirelessly and assiduously to bring those responsible to justice for this most heinous crime which has shocked all of the gardaí involved,” Garda Chief Supt O’Sullivan added.
Garda Supt John Gilligan of the Garda Press Office said the discovery of Ms Rostas’s body had significantly advanced the case and several motives and lines of inquiry were being investigated.
A number of suspects had been identified but there was “a lot more work to be done” and it was “important for this country that we follow it to the end”.
Seven people – five men and two women – have been arrested since the investigation into her disappearance began in January 2008. The arrests were made in November 2008 and October 2009.
Anyone with information should contact Pearse Street Garda station on (01) 666 9000 or the Garda confidential line on 1800 666111.
Garda Supt Gilligan said the force was particularly keen to hear from a man living in Co Wexford who contacted Pearse Street Garda station anonymously in June 2008, and an unnamed woman who provided information during a 999 call in September of the same year.
Authorities are liaising with the Rostas family in Romania regarding the repatriation of her remains.