{"id":31898,"date":"2025-09-20T01:17:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-20T01:17:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/31898\/"},"modified":"2025-09-20T01:17:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T01:17:06","slug":"christmas-deaths-of-father-and-son-in-donegal-examined-at-double-inquest-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/31898\/","title":{"rendered":"Christmas deaths of father and son in Donegal examined at double inquest \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">A double inquest has heard how a father and son were found dead at their home in Co <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/donegal\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/donegal\">Donegal<\/a> just two days before Christmas.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Daniel Duffy and his son Damien were discovered at their bungalow in Windyhall on the outskirts of Letterkenny on December 23rd, 2021 after a carer called around at 10.30am.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Daniel Duffy (88) was found dead in his bed. Damien (50) was found a short time later by garda\u00ed in a disused car in a shed at the rear of the home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The inquests were held by Donegal county coroner, Dr Denis McCauley in Letterkenny on Friday. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">HSE care assistant Bridgeen Doherty told the inquest she called to the home and found the front door unlocked. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The blinds were pulled down in Daniel\u2019s bedroom and he did not reply to Ms Doherty. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\"> She said it was obvious that he had died, presumed it had been in his sleep and called an ambulance. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\"> She then noticed there was blood on the bed and on Mr Duffy\u2019s neck and ear.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">In the living area she scraped her hand on broken glass on the door, noticed it was black with soot and knew immediately something was wrong. The emergency services subsequently arrived. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Ms Doherty told the inquest she had been looking after Mr Duffy since 2021.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">\u201cHe was a lovely man, a real gentleman, I loved Danny,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Garda Sergeant Elaine Gordon told the inquest she got a call of a sudden death and arrived at the house at 10.36am. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">She attempted to phone Mr Duffy\u2019s son Damien but got no response.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">She told how she found dark bruising on the deceased man\u2019s right hand as well as blood on his left ear and on his pillow.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">She then moved to the kitchen and realised there had been a fire there. She said her suspicions had been aroused and something \u201cdidn\u2019t add up\u201d when she noticed blood coming out of Mr Duffy\u2019s ear and some hair on the bed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">A doctor pronounced Mr Duffy dead at 3.15pm.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Garda Sergeant Aidan Doherty, a scene of crimes officer, said he suspected there had been an interaction with another person.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Detective Sergeant Seamus O\u2019Donnell of the ballistics division at garda headquarters in Dublin    said the fire was most likely set intentionally at the rear of the livingroom area by lighting a newspaper or something flammable.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Giving evidence via video-link, pathologist Dr Sally Ann Collis   said there was evidence of blunt force trauma and that the deceased had received bruises and lacerations to his head, neck and upper limbs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">He also suffered bruising on the backs of his forearms which may have been defensive in nature.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Garda Inspector Sean McDaid said he believed he Mr Duffy died as a result of blunt force head injuries caused by an intracerebral haemorrhage inflicted by another.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The inquest then turned to the death of Damien Duffy. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Having become concerned for him, garda\u00ed initially searched nearby woods before checking a shed at the back of the Duffy property. He was found deceased in the driver\u2019s seat of an old Peugeot 206 GTI car. A petrol leaf blower was also found in the car.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Pathologist Dr Collis told the inquest that her opinion was that Damien Duffy had died as a result of carbon monoxide toxicity due to inhaling toxins. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">The inquest jury found Daniel Duffy died as a result of blunt force head injuries (intracerebral haemorrhaging) inflicted by another. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall b-it-article-body__text--left\">Damien Duffywas found to have died of carbon monoxide toxicity inhalation of products of combustion, namely a petrol leaf blower, in a confined space. The jury found that death was as a result of suicide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A double inquest has heard how a father and son were found dead at their home in Co&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31899,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1485,61,60,43],"class_list":["post-31898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-donegal","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31898"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31898\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31899"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}