The Cold Case Files (19 page)

Tom Connolly retired from An Garda Síochána in mid-1994. His last major case was his re-investigation of the murder of Grace Livingstone. Detective Sergeant Todd O’Loughlin
continued to work on the case for a number of years, following up on trying to find the unidentified young man seen in the porch of the Livingstone home at 4.40 p.m. on the day of the murder.
O’Loughlin also worked on trying to locate and interview people who had been in the Malahide area and had not been identified during the initial investigation. He also carried out extensive
enquiries over the following years to try and find the source of the black tape used to gag and bind Grace Livingstone. However, following the murder of journalist Veronica Guerin in June 1996,
Todd O’Loughlin was one of a number of experienced detectives who were assigned to catch the criminal gang which had carried out the audacious and cold-blooded murder on Dublin’s Naas
Road. In time O’Loughlin and his colleagues would succeed in breaking up a major criminal network involved in the multi-million euro business of importing drugs into Ireland. It was one of
the biggest criminal investigations in the history of the State, leading to the setting up of the country’s Witness Protection Programme and the successful prosecution of a number of major
criminals, including one who was convicted of murdering Veronica Guerin.

Todd O’Loughlin is now retired, but the work he and Tom Connolly did in 1994 and in subsequent years on the Grace Livingstone case laid the groundwork for any future cold-case review.
Jimmy Livingstone tells me that he has been in contact with the newly established Garda Serious Crime Review Team to ask them to carry out a full re-investigation of the case. “There are very
specific lines of enquiry such as that black tape and the fingerprints which are even more valuable today because technology has advanced,” says Jimmy. “That’s something that must
be done now. The application of current technology to all the physical clues. And every single statement that was made needs to be cross-checked. Through the High Court case I have righted the
wrong which was done to me and Tara and Conor, but there is still the duty of the State to care, and that is why I want the Cold Case Unit to investigate this thoroughly.”

As part of his efforts to get answers, Jimmy has engaged the services of one of Britain’s leading cold-case experts—Mick Burdis, a retired Detective Chief Superintendent who served
as a police officer in England for over 40 years. During his service, Mick was personally involved in investigating over 100 murders and served on a number of national working groups which defined
the standards for managing major incident rooms. Mick now works as a consultant, giving advice to various police forces and individuals about best practice in major crime investigations. He was
asked to give his opinion on best international practice by the Barr Tribunal, which investigated the shooting dead by Gardaí of John Carthy at Abbeylara in Co. Longford in 2000. At Jimmy
Livingstone’s request he has examined the murder of Grace Livingstone in detail over the last number of years, and has joined Jimmy at a number of recent meetings with the Garda Cold Case
Unit.

There are many questions for the Cold Case Unit to ponder in their review of this unsolved murder: What forensic tests have been done on the black tape taken from Grace’s body? What
forensic tests have been done on the light switches which were taken from the Livingstone home in 1992? What forensic tests have been done on the murder weapon? What work has been done to trace all
the people known to have been in The Moorings on the afternoon of 7 December 1992? What is the complete list of items removed from the Livingstone home and garden as part of the original
investigation, and what forensic tests have been done on these items? What has been done to try and establish the country, city, factory which made the black ‘gaffer’ tape found on
Grace’s body? What has been done to try and trace the person, purporting to have important information, who made a number of anonymous phone calls to Malahide Garda station about the case in
the weeks after the murder?

One of the issues which has been considered is the potential for gathering fresh information that a new round of house-to-house enquiries might reveal. The murder of Grace Livingstone was so
shocking that, over two decades later, most people in the locality would still remember exactly where they were and who they were with when they heard the news. It is clear that not every single
person in every single house in Malahide was spoken to by Gardaí as part of the original investigation. In addition, many of the questionnaires filled in by householders in December 1992 are
very short on detail. A fresh round of house-to-house enquiries might well reveal a lot more information which could help the cold-case review. The Cold Case Unit knows that it must have the
resources in place to deal with any information which might be gleaned in this way, or indeed which might be gleaned from any fresh appeal for information.

Jimmy Livingstone still lives in Malahide, but not in The Moorings. He left there some years ago and now lives alone elsewhere. He no longer keeps guns in the house. He shows me file upon file
relating to the unsolved murder of his wife. Grace is buried in Malahide along with their baby girl Maeve, who died aged just 69 days old in 1977. Conor and Tara both live in Dublin and Jimmy sees
them regularly. Jimmy is now a grandad.

In Jimmy’s living room there is a photo of Grace taken at Vernon in northern France. They were on holidays and were delighted to come across a town with the same name as Grace’s
maiden name. In the holiday snapshot Grace poses at a large sign with the name of the town. It is a simple photo, now one of many treasured memories.

After Grace’s murder Jimmy continued working with the Revenue Commissioners. He retired in July 1998 after more than 42 years’ service. He subsequently gave evidence to the
Dáil Public Accounts Committee and was later given an award on the recommendation of the Committee for work he had done in countering the complicity of a number of banks in tax evasion.

The murder of Grace Livingstone is one of a number of murders of women which occurred in the late 1980s and early 1990s which have never been solved. The circumstances of Grace’s murder
are unlike any other; she was the only woman who was bound and gagged in her home and then shot dead. Gardaí often look for a pattern in murder cases to try and ascertain if the same killer
may be responsible for a number of murders. Such a pattern emerged, for example, in relation to the disappearance of a number of women in Ireland from the late 1980s to the late 1990s. But there
was no crime like the murder of Grace Livingstone. Detectives checked in Britain and beyond to try and find similarities with other murders, but no links were found. However, such a line of enquiry
must be continuously pursued. The modus operandi of using the thick black tape to gag and tie up Grace must also be continuously checked with other police forces. What if the killer used a similar
means of attack and constraint in another country?

To this day it is not known where Grace was when the killer first struck. Was she in the kitchen about to start getting dinner ready? Was she elsewhere downstairs? Did she unwittingly answer the
door to the killer? Did he get into the house under false pretences? Was Grace asleep upstairs when she was attacked? What was the motive for the murder? If the motive was burglary, why was nothing
taken? So many questions, and the only real certainties are that the killer was someone who knew how to load and fire a shotgun, and who it appears entered the house armed with a roll of black tape
which they used to tie up and gag Grace before shooting her dead. Perhaps there was more than one person involved. If Grace was first attacked downstairs, perhaps being punched or struck with a
weapon, maybe two attackers carried their victim up to her bedroom.

The coastal village of Malahide is normally a peaceful place. Per head of population it has one of the lowest murder rates in the country. But it is the place where one of the most callous
murders occurred, and the fact that this killing remains unsolved continues to traumatise many.

Jimmy Livingstone may well publish his own book some day. He has most of it written already. He started it many years ago, and it outlines his campaign for justice for Grace and justice for the
rest of the family. But the book has no ending yet. Jimmy will wait and see what happens with the current Garda Cold Case Unit review before deciding his next step.

Jimmy remembers that on the day of his wife’s funeral, the priest who celebrated the mass offered prayers for the investigating Gardaí that God would guide them in their duty with
regard to the horrible crime. Two decades later, that prayer remains the wish of the Livingstone family.

The review currently being undertaken is perhaps the last chance the Livingstones will get to see Grace’s killer brought to justice. Jimmy is now in his seventies and is every bit as
determined today to see justice done as he was in 1992. He says he has managed to keep going due to the support of his family. He mentions his solicitor and good friend Gerry Charleton as also
being particularly supportive from day one. “Having settled the High Court case, that’s a step forward. I don’t know how many more steps there are. I will keep at this with
whatever time the Lord will leave me in this world. That is what I will do. I owe that to Grace.”

S
tephen Hughes Connors was just 12 years old when he was killed in an arson attack in the Dublin suburb of Tallaght in the early hours of 1
September 2001. Stephen was one of two young boys who were sleeping in a makeshift den at Rossfield Avenue and they were both fast asleep when the den was set on fire by a man who has not yet been
brought to justice. Stephen lived elsewhere in the Rossfield estate; the house he shared with his parents and younger sister and brother was just around the corner at Rossfield Park.
Stephen’s parents thought he was staying in a house in the nearby Brookview estate that night. They’d no idea he had instead headed for home but as he had passed by the den he had
decided to join his friends inside. He and a number of other local children were very proud of the den, it was their private space away from adults and older teenagers. Stephen had never slept
there before, but he had been in it during the daytime. The den was made up of a number of wooden pallets, and had a covering for the roof. The children had got a two-seater sofa and a foam
mattress which they had placed inside. They had also sourced some carpet remnants and floor mats. The den was near the front of the Rossfield estate, close to where the old shops had been. It was
set in the front garden of a now disused building. Not everyone approved of the den, but for many parents it was a place where they knew their children were playing within yards of their own homes,
a place where children should have been able to play safely.

It is not very often that the events leading up to a killing are captured on camera. However, by chance, the person who set the fire which claimed Stephen’s life was caught on video. The
footage is dark and grainy, but the man is seen entering the front garden and walking towards the den at around 5.10 a.m. The den itself is just out of vision on the footage, but what is without
doubt is that when the man leaves the den a short time later, a flash of light is reflected on the back of his jacket. This seems to be some form of explosion as the fire takes hold in the den.
These are the moments Stephen Hughes Connors lost his life.

There is also more information from the video camera which was recording all night from the bedroom of a house nearby. At about 5.01 a.m.—nine or ten minutes before the fire took
hold—the man is seen approaching the den for the first time. He walks along the footpath from within the Rossfield estate and turns left into the driveway where the makeshift den is housed.
Intriguingly, he has a dog with him on the first occasion. The dog wanders around on the road outside while the man walks towards the den. We don’t know what he was doing because the den is
not in vision, but a short time later the man emerges from the driveway and walks back into the Rossfield estate as the dog follows him. When the man reappears at the den and sets the fire at 5.10
a.m. or so, the dog is not with him. The video camera footage which captured all this information had been set up by a man who was trying to catch someone who had previously damaged a vehicle of
his. What he captured in the early hours of a September morning were the moments before, during and after the death of a young boy.

When I meet Stephen’s parents Billy and Liz, the loss of their eldest child is evident. Stephen was a joker, a chatterbox, he had a great sense of humour, was naturally funny. In his
twelve years, six months and three weeks of life, Stephen left countless memories for his parents and his sister Kelly and brother Gerry. Kelly was eleven years old when her brother died, while
Gerry was just four. Stephen’s two youngest brothers weren’t born when he was killed. But Johnathan and Jason are constantly asking about the older brother they never knew. Jason is the
image of Stephen, he has the same red hair, the same smile and the same sense of fun.