Concurrent life sentences for double island murders

Double murderer Ruth Lawrence has been handed two concurrent life sentences for the killings of drug dealer Eoin O’Connor and his friend Anthony Keegan, whose bound bodies were discovered buried in a shallow grave on a Lough Sheelin island 11 years ago.

The emotional sentencing hearing at the Central Criminal Court earlier this week heard four victim impact statements, with family members describing the impact the “horrific” murders have had, and the years of torment that followed.

Karen Roche, partner of Eoin O’Connor, said she lives with the terror her partner experienced after watching his best friend shot dead in front of him.

“I think of the panic he must have felt when he knew he was going to be next,” she told the court. “I know he struggled and fought and tried his best to live, but they wouldn’t let him.”

She said it was devastating to hear evidence that Lawrence found it “funny” that one man said he would die for his friend. “I wonder is she laughing now,” she asked.

Anthony Keegan’s sister, Margaret Keegan, said her family had spent weeks searching for his body. They were haunted by questions: “Was he shot first? Did he die instantly? Did he feel fear?

“To think that someone would laugh at the violent death of someone’s loved one is beyond belief,” she said. “As a woman and a mother, it makes us sick to our stomach.”

She described Lawrence as “cold and callous”, noting she had spent a decade in a country with no extradition treaty and had even adopted the email address ‘RuthofallEvil’ and the surname ‘Lawless’.

“If Ruth was left to her plans, our loved ones would be at the bottom of that lake,” she said.

Children traumatised

Mr O’Connor’s daughter, Brook Roche - who was just 10 at the time - said she grew up “a scared child” without understanding why.

“Selling drugs is no reason to die the way my father did,” she said. “He did it to put a roof over our heads. The way he died is no reflection on my dad.”

Calling Lawrence “an evil person”, she added: “No sentence will ever be enough, but hopefully guilt and shame will be a lifetime sentence for her.”

‘Highly calculated’

A jury last November found that Lawrence, originally from Clontarf but living at Ross, Mountnugent, shot Mr O’Connor after luring him to the rural Cavan home she shared with her South African boyfriend, Neville van der Westhuizen.

Mr O’Connor had both supplied drugs to Van der Westhuizen - who it’s said owed him about €70,000 - and had drugs stolen from him six days earlier in a theft planned by the wayward couple.

According to the evidence, Lawrence shot O’Connor in the stomach intending to kill him, before Van der Westhuizen delivered a fatal shot to the head.

Anthony Keegan, who had travelled with his childhood friend, was then shot in the neck and head.

Prosecuting counsel said Lawrence and Van der Westhuizen acted as “a unit and a tag team” in a “highly calculated crime”.

Witness Stacey Symes, who along with her father is now in a witness protection programme, testified that Lawrence thought it was “funny” Keegan said he would die for his friend.

Both men’s bodies were wrapped in tarpaulin, taken by boat to Inchicup Island on Lough Sheelin and buried. They were discovered five weeks later in an advanced state of decomposition.

Fled to South Africa

Lawrence and Van der Westhuizen left Ireland shortly after the murders and fled to South Africa. Lawrence was extradited in May 2023 and has no previous convictions.

An arrest warrant is in place for Van der Westhuizen, who is serving a 15-year sentence in South Africa for unrelated offences.

His extradition to Ireland may be revisited once his sentence ends, possibly in 2035.

‘Callous and disrespectful’

Handing down the concurrent life sentences - backdated to October 4, 2022, when Lawrence was first remanded in custody - Mr Justice Tony Hunt said the families had painted “a very articulate picture of the trauma caused over a long period of time”.

He said “whatever went on” did not justify the “violent deaths these men endured” or “the callous and disrespectful way their bodies were treated”.

He praised the courage of the victims’ families, gardaí, and the witnesses in the case.

Lawrence stood as she was formally sentenced to life for each murder, the terms to run concurrently.