The Tusla accommodation where a Ukrainian teenager died violently on Wednesday was an unregulated emergency placement run by a private care provider.
Vadym Davydenko (17) suffered stab wounds in the incident at an apartment in Dublin that had been contracted by the child and family agency.
The teenager had recently travelled to Dublin, via Poland. When he missed one of his flights his mother urged him “don’t go, come home”, but he decided to persist with his journey, arriving in Dublin on Tuesday.
“We don’t know Ireland, we don’t really know what to do. Vadym’s mother is now looking to go to Ireland so she can see her boy,” a family friend said.
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Another 17-year-old boy, also from abroad, remained in a Dublin hospital on Thursday as he was injured during the incident. He is the chief suspect in the case and gardaí are keen to interview him.
A care worker who tried to intervene was also wounded, but she was expected to make a full physical recovery.
Two other teenage boys, from a third country, were also present and tried to intervene, but it is understood they were not injured.
Vadym Davydenko, whose family is from Kyiv, was fatally stabbed in an apartment at the Grattan Wood complex in Donaghmede, Dublin 13, just after 11am on Wednesday.
He was one of four separated children seeking international protection, so-called SCSIPs, being housed in the apartment.
[ Ukrainian teen Vadym Davydenko killed in Dublin had only just arrived in IrelandOpens in new window ]
The apartment was contracted by Tusla as a special emergency arrangement (SEA). Fifteen companies shared €56 million in payments from Tusla last year to run such SEAs.
The use of this type of accommodation for vulnerable children has been repeatedly criticised as they are unregulated, located typically in rented apartments or hotels and staffed by private providers.
They are not inspected by the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa).
A Hiqa spokeswoman, asked whether it had inspected the Donaghmede facility, said on Wednesday: “This service does not fall within the remit of the Health Information and Quality Authority.
“Children’s residential centres run by voluntary or private organisations commissioned by Tusla are not within Hiqa’s remit, nor are special emergency arrangements.”
Earlier this year Tusla, warned of an increasing risk it would “not be able to provide services in line with standards and regulations” to children seeking international protection and from Ukraine “due to the significant increase in the number of arrivals and the lack of sufficient resources to meet the demand”.
“This could result in a large number of children being placed in special emergency arrangements,” it said.
A source who knew Vadym Davydenko said he was “quite into sport” and was “studying IT, he wanted to move on to cybersecurity and, with everything happening in Ukraine, to support the military against the Russian aggression ... to [go back] and fight on the frontline lines in a cyberdivision”.
“He wanted to get a better education in Ireland and, you know, that is going to be difficult in Ukraine, it’s very difficult. I don’t know how such a bright person can be taken away like this.”
Vadym Davydenko had a girlfriend in Ukraine and, though she is just 16, they were hoping to be together at some point in Ireland.
However, she was now “absolutely devastated” to learn of his death as were his parents and other family members.
[ Donaghmede stabbing: ‘I came home to chaos. People were covered in blood’Opens in new window ]
Tusla had 619 new referrals to its SCSIP teams last year – a 32 per cent rise on 2023. Of these, 570 were taken into care or accommodated by Tusla, bringing the total of such children in its care last year to 893.
A third of this cohort were from Ukraine, with two-thirds of children seeking international protection from countries including Somalia, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Palestine, Syria, Zimbabwe and Pakistan. Most were male and aged 16 or 17.
A recent report from Epic, an advocacy group for children and young people in care, raised concerns about using SEAs to accommodate children seeking asylum.
It said these often had lower staffing ratios, staff could be less qualified to deal with trauma and tensions within the homes, and accommodation could be inferior to facilities run directly by Tusla.
