{"id":113653,"date":"2025-10-10T15:44:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/113653\/"},"modified":"2025-10-10T15:44:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T15:44:11","slug":"you-took-my-daughters-life-and-stole-her-future-mother-tells-man-who-lit-fatal-house-fire-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/113653\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018You took my daughter\u2019s life and stole her future,\u2019 mother tells man who lit fatal house fire \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The mother of a woman killed in a house fire three years ago has told the man convicted of her murder that he \u201cstole her future\u201d and left two children without their mother.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">George Turner (56) murdered Emma McCrory (nee Costello), aged 45, by setting fire to her home on December 15th, 2022. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">He told garda\u00ed he did it because he believed she had \u201cno quality of life\u201d and he wanted to \u201ctake her out of her pain\u201d. However, he later told officers he thought the fire might cause her to be evicted and that she would then live with him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In a statement at court on Friday, Ms McCrory\u2019s mother, Pauline Costello, described her daughter as \u201cbeautiful inside and out\u201d. She was adored by her family, got on with all and was there for everyone, Ms Costello said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">When Ms McCrory died, her father was in the advanced stages of Parkinson\u2019s disease. He died two weeks after his daughter. Ms Costello said she did not tell him what had happened and visited him every day until his death with the pain of knowing his \u201cadored child\u201d was dead.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Speaking to Turner, she said: \u201cMy daughter was very vulnerable when she met you. You took her life and stole her future. You left two children growing up without their mother. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cAs for me, I am left to contemplate life without the support of my daughter. Emma was much more than what happened to her and she will never be forgotten.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Turner, of Fairview Avenue, Fairview, in Dublin, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/crime-law\/courts\/2025\/10\/06\/man-55-pleads-guilty-to-murder-of-mother-of-two-in-dublin\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/crime-law\/courts\/2025\/10\/06\/man-55-pleads-guilty-to-murder-of-mother-of-two-in-dublin\/\">pleaded guilty<\/a> on Monday to the murder of Ms McCrory at her home on Howth Road, Clontarf.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ms Justice Eileen Creedon on Friday sentenced him to the mandatory term of life imprisonment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Before the judge passed sentence, Det Garda Cliff Singleton said Ms McCrory\u2019s neighbours alerted emergency services to a fire at her mews home at about 8.20pm. Dublin Fire Brigade crews found the house burned out with Ms McCrory\u2019s body in an upstairs bedroom.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">A Garda technical team established the fire started near the foot of her bed. A postmortem  confirmed she died from inhaling the products of combustion, including carbon monoxide, with no other contributory factors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ms McCrory had drugs and alcohol in her system, which Det Garda Singleton said would have made her sleepy and vulnerable when the fire was set.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Garda\u00ed learned Turner had earlier that day used Ms McCrory\u2019s ATM card to withdraw money and buy her alcohol. It was Turner who alerted neighbours to the fire after smoke started to billow from the windows. Garda\u00ed spoke to him, but he did not reveal his part. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Garda investigation continued until, on March 15th, 2023, Turner went voluntarily to Clontarf Garda station and admitted he started the fire. He was arrested and detained. He said he believed Ms McCrory had no quality of life, adding she told him she did not want to live.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">He said he set fire to her bed clothes as she slept and left when he saw the fire start to smoulder. He said he wished it did not happen but he would do it again and was relieved for the deceased\u2019s sake. He said he wanted to \u201ctake her out of her pain\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">In a later interview, he said he wanted to give her a \u201cwake-up call\u201d. He said he thought an alarm would go off once the duvet began to smoulder and he did not think she would die.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Det Singleton said garda\u00ed established that in the days following her death, Turner continued to use Ms McCrory\u2019s ATM card. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">He has 42 previous convictions, the most significant of which was in 2016 for possession of firearms, ammunition and drugs for sale or supply.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Philipp Rahn SC, for Turner, asked the court to note for the record that his client has had significant mental health difficulties. His problems were compounded by substance abuse. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The mother of a woman killed in a house fire three years ago has told the man convicted&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":113654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[956,9,10,32943,52,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-113653","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-an-garda-siochana","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-clontarf","12":"tag-dublin","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-featured-news","15":"tag-featurednews","16":"tag-headlines","17":"tag-ie","18":"tag-ireland","19":"tag-latest-news","20":"tag-latestnews","21":"tag-main-news","22":"tag-mainnews","23":"tag-news","24":"tag-top-stories","25":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}