34 - The murder of Una Lynsky, Wrongful Convictions & fight for Justice

Mens Rea: A true crime podcast

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True Crime, Society & Culture

4.7 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 3 February 2019

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In October 1971, on a rural lane south of the village of Ratoath, Co Meath, Una Lynsky disappeared while walking a short distance from a bus stop to her home. Around that time, screams were heard and a strange car was seen driving up and down the lane. But three local lads, Dick Donnelly, Martin Kerrigan, and Martin Conmey found that they were the ones who had drawn the attention of the notorious Murder Squad of the Garda Siochana. By the end of the year, two young people from Porterstown Lane would be dead. Two trials would follow and a series of appeals to try and clear a man's name of guilt that did not belong to him. Our featured promo this week is from good friends, All Crime No Cattle. Erin and Shea are experts at the conversational true crime podcast, and back it up with phenomenal research and production. Go subscribe today! Find us on Facebook or Twitter! With thanks to our supporters on Patreon! If you would like to support the podcast, head on over to Patreon.com. Theme Music: Quinn’s Song: The Dance Begins by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by Sources: The Criminal Justice Act 1993 (available here: http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/1993/act/6/enacted/en/print) DPP -V- MARTIN CONMEY, [2012] IECCA 75 (2012) Sarah McInerney, Where No One Can Hear You Scream (Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 2008) Purchase here Michael Clifford, “Martin Conmey walks the long, hard, road to justice” in The Irish Examiner https://www.irishexaminer.com/viewpoints/columnists/michael-clifford/martin-conmey-walks-the-long-hard-road-to-justice-430703.html (16 November 2016) Mary Carolan, “State apologises to man jailed in miscarriage of justice” in the Irish Times https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/high-court/state-apologises-to-man-jailed-in-miscarriage-of-justice-1.2868751 (15 November 2016) Aodhan O'Faoilan, “An innocent man; Martin Conmey, 63, was jailed for the manslaughter of his neighbour in 1972... yesterday his name was finally cleared after a 'miscarriage of justice'.. The Free Library https://www.thefreelibrary.com/An+innocent+man%3b+Martin+Conmey%2c+63%2c+was+jailed+for+the+manslaughter...-a0376505736 (2014) Michael Clifford, “40 years waiting to clear his name ' in The Irish Examiner https://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/features/profiles/40-years-waiting-to-clear-his-name-199954.html (7 July 2012) https://www.townlands.ie/meath/ratoath/rathbeggan/dunshaughlin/porterstown/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1971_in_Ireland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratoath

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the mens rea podcast and this is the story of Una Linsky. Oh, 1971 was a bit of a mixed bag in terms of Irish history.
0:46.0	It was the beginning of a decade not marked by economic decline
0:51.0	and which would also see a number of important constitutional rulings, marking the beginning of rights movements in the country.
0:58.0	It was the year that the women's liberation movement traveled to Belfast and rode back on what would become known as the
1:05.4	contraception train, family planning being something that was generally frowned upon at the time.
1:12.2	In January of that year Archbishop John McQuaid, who had had a huge political influence, retired after 30 years in the post.
1:21.0	Aeman Devallera was at that point President of Ireland, having played a vital role in the
1:27.0	1916 rising more than half a century before.
1:31.6	By September of 1971, a hundred people had been killed in the Troubles, which had started only three years previously.
1:40.0	The 70s were a decade marking the beginning of a change here, with a generation coming of age who had no memories of the rising or the war of independence or even living under British rule.
1:53.0	Just south of the small village of Rathot, County Meath,
1:57.0	this generation of young people were working.
2:00.0	They worked on the farms owned by family or travelled south to Dublin City to work in offices or factories.
2:07.0	Ratot was a small village at this point in time with maybe about a thousand people living there, though it was still a relatively
2:14.9	busy and focal point for the more spread-out neighborhoods that dotted the countryside.
2:21.3	South of Rathoth is the small townland of Porter's Town.
2:25.0	It is effectively made up of the homes that line Porter's Town Lane,
2:29.5	which connects the old main road from Dublin to Navin to the west through another mid-sized town in the area Dunshachlan and the fairy house road at its eastern end which goes up to Ratolt.
2:42.0	The people living on the road in the 70s were close, as you'd expect in a rural
2:46.7	townland, given the relative isolation and proximity to one another. But there was yet another reason for the closeness.
2:54.8	Many of the families living in and around Porter's Town Lane were blow-ins to the area.
3:00.0	Having moved from the west of Ireland, Mayo specifically, in the first half of the century.
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