A WOMAN was questioned by gardaí yesterday in relation to the discovery of human remains in Co Westmeath over 15 years ago.
The woman, who is in her 60s, was arrested as part of an investigation into the discovery of a man's remains beside a house in Coole, near Castlepollard, Co Westmeath, in 1993.
Investigators believe the body is that of Brian McGrath, a Dublin native who was 43-years-old when he disappeared in 1987.
Mr McGrath was not reported missing until a family member approached gardaí some six years later.
A follow-up investigation resulted in a Garda search team uncovering the unidentified human remains in an overgrown garden attached to a cottage which had been the McGrath family home.
Detectives suspected at the time that attempts had been made to set the body alight before it was secretly buried. In May of this year, gardaí investigating the disappearance reopened their investigation. They exhumed a body from a cemetery in Co Westmeath and also began a forensic examination of Mr McGrath's former home, because of advances in investigative technologies and techniques, including DNA, which were not available to the original investigation team.
Over 25 Garda personnel, assisted by a Crime Scene Investigation team from the Garda Technical Bureau; the Forensic Science Laboratory; an external soil surveying company and an anthropologist, participated in the investigation. A file was submitted to the Director of Public Prosecutions following the investigation, but no prosecution followed.
The woman was arrested shortly after 8am yesterday in Co Westmeath by members of the Garda's Serious Crime Review Unit, which revisits cold case investigations, who were assisted by gardaí from the Longford division.
She is being detained at Mullingar Garda station under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act and can be held for 24 hours.
