![\"Crash](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/one-of-teens-killed-in-motorway-crash-was-in-the-care-of-tusla.jpg\")
The scene of the crash on the M9 in Co Kildare on Sunday in which five teenagers lost their lives (PA)<\/p>\nOne of the five teenagers who died in a horror motorway crash in Co Kildare last weekend was in the care of Tusla, it has been confirmed.<\/p>\n
The child and family agency also said two of the young people were known to it.<\/p>\n
The teenagers died after the car they were travelling in was driven the wrong way down the M9 and was involved in a head-on collision with another car.<\/p>\n
They have been named locally as Joe Carthy, Jack Kennedy, Alex McCarthy, Jeremy O\u2019Brien and Kamil Pustkowski.<\/p>\n
The scene of the crash on the M9 in Co Kildare on Sunday in which five teenagers lost their lives (PA)<\/p>\n
A child and three women from the same family, who were in the other car, are being treated for serious injuries in hospital.<\/p>\n
A funeral service for Alex McCarthy will take place in Holy Family Church, Askea, Carlow, on Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n
On Thursday evening, Tusla said in a statement: \u201cWe can confirm that one of the young people involved in the serious incident on the M9 on Sunday morning was in the care of Tusla and two of the young people were known to the agency.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur staff have been in contact with their families and there is ongoing liaison with An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur thoughts are with all of those who have been affected by this tragic incident.\u201d<\/p>\n
They added it will share all information required with the National Review Panel, which independently reviews death or serious incidents to children known to Tusla or in State care, \u201cin line with standard reporting processes\u201d.<\/p>\n
Earlier, it emerged that TikTok has declined to publicly appear before an Oireachtas committee probing online videos of dangerous driving, with the social media giant instead offering a private briefing to lawmakers.<\/p>\n
TikTok had been invited to appear before the Oireachtas media committee on September 23 to address issues on how it deals with content that \u201cglorifies illegal activity\u201d but has declined the opportunity.<\/p>\n
Media regulator Coimisi\u00fan na Me\u00e1n has also sought a \u201cfull account\u201d of how TikTok is dealing with reports of illegal or harmful content on its platform, with the authority adding it is in \u201cclose contact\u201d with An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na.<\/p>\n
TikTok said it would not be \u201cpossible\u201d to appear before the committee given probes into the matter by garda\u00ed and the regulator. It also said it would not be \u201cappropriate\u201d for it to be the sole video-sharing company to be called in front of the committee when similar content appears on other social media platforms.<\/p>\n
The company says it has removed all the flagged content and banned accounts that violate its policies against criminal behaviour.<\/p>\n
It also said it removes content that glorifies violence and promotes crime that could harm others, while limiting the spread of material that encourages unsafe behaviour including risky driving.<\/p>\n
TikTok said it had offered a \u201cprivate briefing\u201d to members of the committee.<\/p>\n
![\"Action](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1787277131_411_one-of-teens-killed-in-motorway-crash-was-in-the-care-of-tusla.jpg\")
Minister for Enterprise Peter Burke said children \u2018come first\u2019 (Brian Lawless\/PA)<\/p>\n
Earlier, Enterprise Minister Peter Burke said children \u201ccome first\u201d over tax revenues from social media giants.<\/p>\n
Burke said \u201cvery extreme\u201d content has \u201cbeen allowed to sit there for protracted periods of time\u201d, adding that this was \u201cnot good enough\u201d at a time when social media companies were \u201cshedding staff\u201d.<\/p>\n
Burke said: \u201cI\u2019ve been very clear, irrespective of what tax revenue comes in from any social media company, our children are first.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is so important to me that we handle this robustly. We give the social media company the opportunity, obviously, to appear before the Oireachtas but, critically, they have in their purview, in their power, to take down these videos.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou see a lot of these social media companies shedding staff, shedding numbers, and yet this content seems to be ever growing that\u2019s appearing on them.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd anecdotal evidence seems to be that it\u2019s very extreme and it\u2019s been allowed to sit there for protracted periods of time to gain likes and gain interactions from other peers in the community, and frankly, that\u2019s not good enough and we need to take action.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meta, which operates Instagram and Facebook, has policies to restrict users under 18 from seeing imagery depicting real-life dangerous driving likely to cause injury, as well as a prohibition of content promoting criminal or harmful activities such as high-risk viral challenges.<\/p>\n
Snap has also been contacted for comment.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, a fundraiser for the four members of the same family who were seriously injured had raised almost \u20ac600,000 by 2.30pm on Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the five teenagers who died in a horror motorway crash in Co Kildare last weekend was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":599730,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-599729","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599729","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=599729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}