The case that shocked the nation: Four decades on, we look back on the Kerry Babies tragedy
It was the case that shocked the nation but almost four decades on the Kerry Babies tragedy threatens to open a window into Ireland’s dark misogynistic past.
Minister Harris said it was “despicable and unacceptable” the way Joanne Hayes and her family were treated at the time. What would become one of Ireland's most notorious cases began on April 14, 1984, when an infant's lifeless body washed ashore on the White Strand, Cahersiveen. At the time Joanne Hayes who had been known to be pregnant was soon arrested by gardaí as part of their investigations.
Gardai claimed to have got a confession out of Ms Hayes and her family. But the State's case fell apart when her baby was found on the family farm proving she had been telling the truth all along. Ms Hayes was effectively set up for a crime she did not commit when gardai wrongly connected her to the dead baby.
The Kerry Babies Tribunal was supposedly set up to investigate the behaviour of the gardaí during the initial case but, in reality, it sought to destroy Joanne Hayes’ reputation. Her questioning by lawyers for gardai was so aggressive that it appeared to many that she was on tail a second time.
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