A man is feared to have left the State with the body of his mother, it was revealed today.
Authorities said they believed the man, in his 60s and from the south of England, had been living in Kenmare, Co Kerry, for the last two years.
The county coroner had warned yesterday he must bury or cremate his mother, who died in September.
Coroner Terence Casey, a solicitor, said he no longer knew the whereabouts of the body of the elderly English woman which had been placed in a rented house in Kenmare, in early October, apparently by her son.
According to sources, she was laid out in a bedroom of a house rented by her son. A coffin was also in the house.
The family had rented the house in the town centre in recent months. The woman had been confined to a wheelchair. Her son, in his early 60s, was “devoted to her”, according to one local man.
A Garda spokesman said officers were made aware after October 14th that the man had been living in the rented house in the town with his mother’s body.
“The man was found in his house with his mother,” the Garda spokesman said. “Both gardaí and the Coroner’s Office liaised with him and spoke with him. There was an undertaking given to bury his mother.”
The dead woman was in her 90s and had been living in Malta where she was taken ill and died from pneumonia on September 24th.
Mr Casey said her son flew her body back from Malta to London’s Gatwick airport, put the coffin in a car and drove to Ireland. Mr Casey said the body was not declared at Customs in Ireland.
The Coroner’s Office was contacted about the woman’s remains being kept in a rented house on the same day as the Garda were notified.
The coroner said the man had previously told his landlord he was leaving the house in Kenmare as his mother was ill in Malta.
“When the landlord went into the house approximately a week later, he discovered our man back in the house, who informed him that his mother died in Malta and that he was sorry but he was coming back to Ireland and wanted to live in the house again,” the coroner said.
Mr Casey said the man had added “that his mother was laid out in the bed upstairs if he wanted to go and pay his respects”.
Additional reporting PA