A Waterford woman who allegedly shared pictures of the boys convicted of the murder of Ana Kriégel – known as Boy A and Boy B – despite specific court instructions forbidding such actions, will appear in Waterford District Court on December 10th for plea or hearing.
Rebecca Ryan (25), of Priory Lawn, Ballybeg is charged with two offences under the Children Act that prohibits the identification of minors accused or convicted of a criminal offence. She did not appear in Waterford District Court this morning due to Level 5 Covid-19 restrictions.
Outlining the details of the case, Detective Garda Niall Carolyn stated that on June 18th, 2019, two male juveniles were convicted of the murder of Anastasia Kriégel.
Throughout the trial, and after their conviction, Judge Paul McDermott ordered that no material that could lead, or is likely to lead to the identification of any child concerned in the proceedings should be published.
In the days after the conviction of Boy A and Boy B a number of online postings came to the attention of gardaí, including an alleged Twitter post by Ms Ryan. The tweet contained both text and images depicting the two boys convicted of Ms Kriégel’s murder, the court was told.
The text above the images, allegedly written by Ms Ryan stated “Here’s Boy A and Boy B the two murdering b*****ds”.
The post made reference to the fact that the boy’s identities were being protected and then ended the tweet with the hashtag #JusticeForAnna. The image allegedly posted by Ms Ryan was one that appeared on a number of platforms and was a cropped photo with other youths, whose faces were scribbled over.
The two boys were highlighted with red circles and the letters “A” and “B” identifying them. Investigating gardaí deemed the post to be a breach of a court order and after Ms Ryan was identified as the author of the post, the court was told, she was questioned on July 2nd, 2019.
Defending, solicitor Hilary Delahunty stated that the defendant had no previous convictions and the post in question was one of a number that were published by several different people. Mr Delahunty stated that it was his impression that Ms Ryan had retweeted someone else’s post and it wasn’t an original post.
Det Gda Carolyn confirmed that this prosecution was the first of a number that were to follow. He said the images had been taken from Facebook and posted in a separate post on Twitter by Ms Ryan. He said it was something that was done in the “heat of the moment”.
Judge Kevin Staunton said the case in question “couldn’t have been more serious” and if you stopped anyone on the street, they would know what case was being referred to.
“It is an offence to post on social media, any reference to juveniles being involved in any case - but this couldn’t have been a more serious case,” Judge Staunton said. “Even in the absence of a direction from a judge I don’t know how anyone could think that it would be alright to do this. In this case, there is a specific direction from the judge saying that this wasn’t to be done.”
The case was adjourned to December 10th for plea or hearing.