A man was found stabbed to death outside his family home in north Dublin in the early hours of this morning.
The dead man has not been identified but has been named locally as Shane O’Connor, a 22-year-old with at address at St Donagh’s Rd, Donaghmede, north Dublin.
He was known to the gardaí and had been investigated twice for assaults on his girlfriend in which bottles were used on both occasions. Late last year he had been jailed for 16 months for one of those attacks and had recently been released.
He had not completed his sentence but had been given open ended temporary which was to be renewed until his sentence period had expired. It is a form of early release used by the Irish Prison Service to ease overcrowding and make way for new committals.
O’Connor was found outside his family home at around 7am this morning. Gardaí received an emergency call when his injured body was found on the road. An ambulance arrived at the scene and took O’Connor to Beaumont Hospital.
Gardaí have launched a murder inquiry and believed they can account for the dead man’s last known movements until around 3am yesterday.
They believe he was out socialising with his girlfriend and others on Saturday night and into yesterday morning at two pubs in Raheny and Clonshaugh, both in north Dublin.
Gardaí are working on the theory that he was stabbed outside his home some time after 3am after making his way there.
The stretch of road where he was found is a high density local authority housing estate and gardaí are hopeful some local people may be able to provide information that would aid the investigation.
There was a disturbance in the area in the early hours of yesterday morning which is believed to have been reported to the Garda. However, it is unclear if that disturbance was in any way linked to O’Connor’s fatal stabbing.
Members of his family were asleep in the house overnight. The street was sealed off immediately gardaí arrived at the scene.
Members of the Garda Technical Bureau erected a tented structure over the spot where Mr O’Connor was found in order to protect it from the elements and preserve any forensic evidence that may be present.
However, gardaí had sealed off a large stretch of road and members of the force were examining a number of stretches of the street and a number of parked cars.
They were trying to establish if a row may have taken place along a stretch of the street or if O’Connor may have made his way injured towards his home before collapsing just yards from his front door.
The motive for the murder remains unclear though gardaí are trying to establish if O’Connor had become involved in any disputes while in jail or if he had been threatened by anyone in the weeks since his release.
The investigation into the murder is based at Coolock Garda station. Supt Ronan Galligan urged anybody in the area or who knew O’Connor and may have information that would help solve the crime to come forward.
He said gardaí were especially keen to speak to anyone who was on St Donagh’s Rd between 3am and 7am yesterday.
O’Connor was jailed in November 2011 for 16 months on two counts of assault causing harm. His girlfriend was the victim on both occasions.
Aged 19 years he threw a bottle at her in a row in a hotel room in north Dublin and when it smashed against a wall shards of glass became embedded him her head. Some 12 months later, in October 2010 he hit her with another bottle in a supermarket car park.
