Press

Press Statement delivered on Monday 29th July, 2024 after the sentencing of james kilroy for the murder of Valerie French

I am Valerie’s brother

I speak on behalf of her three sisters and sons.

I’d like to thank the Garda teams in Westport and Castlebar who responded to the initial alert and ran a textbook investigation from start to finish. In particular Kevin Gately, Mick Doherty, Gary Walsh, Aisling Barrett, Leanne Nallen, David Timlins, Declan Sweeney, William Grant, Conor McHale, Kieran McGinty, Colm Boyle, Dermot Kenny, Adrian Joyce, John McNamara,David Hannigan, Joe Grady, Pat O’Houra,Russell Gibbons and Keith Deane.

I’d like to thank the people in the DPP especially Aoife O’Halloran and Bridget, the Court Service and Denis Harrington and particularly the barristers Anne Marie Lawlor, Dean Kelly, Patrick Gageby, Conor McKenna and Michael Hourigan who all worked on this case.

I’d like to thank all three juries for their care and attention in assessing the facts and evidence in this case. 

I’d also like to thank the media who broke the story, respectfully reported the funeral and kept public focus on this terrible crime across repeated trials over five years. Killers would like these stories to be forgotten and put under the carpet. The media stop this from happening, hold public attention and help to force accountability.

There are many other families that know the loss that comes after domestic homicide. The families of Jasmine McMonagle in Donegal, Jennifer Poole and Rachel Callally in Dublin, Olivia Dunlea in Cork, Nadine Lott in Wicklow and hundreds of others. This is the result of men’s violence against women. Any woman who is being abused or controlled should contact Gardai while they still can.

The very simple narrative here is: they had an argument, she went out to buy groceries while he said he had a few drinks. When she came home later he murdered her and then abandoned the children. 

Valerie was a wonderful person. Her work as an occupational therapist with people in need of those services in Mayo demonstrated this and she was highly regarded by her colleagues and clients there.

Valere was a great sister. She was very positive. She was highly capable and practical. She was also great fun.

Valerie was a much loved daughter. Our mother died suddenly not long after hearing news of Valerie’s death.

Valerie was also a mother. She went through a lot of pain, expense and heartbreak to give birth to her children. She was the main breadwinner for her family. On the last day of her life she took them to school and she organised the insulation of their house. She worked and she ran an AirBnB. One of her last acts was buying groceries for her family. It appears her last words were “What about the boys ?”.

In a very real sense I believe that Valerie died while fighting to protect her children from kilroy.

Valerie’s husband killed her brutally yet he retains all his parental rights to her children. This is an absolutely ridiculous situation. Killing a mother is child abuse.Children have to be protected from abusers. Murderers in the UK have their parental rights suspended under what is called Jade’s Law. 

This loophole needs to be closed to protect the children who are put in this hellish situation every year.

Thank you for your support