Kyran Durnin: Search ends in ‘extraordinary’ missing child case

The head of An Garda Síochána (Ireland’s police force) has said that in his 40 years as a police officer he “has never seen a set of circumstances” like those in the case of missing schoolchild Kyran Durnin.

Commissioner Drew Harris said that there is a “particular element” to the case that is “difficult to comprehend”.

He described the case as “extraordinary” and that gardaí (police) are “pursuing this with a full vigour”.

Kyran was reported missing at the end of August but last week gardaí said the boy is now “presumed dead” and they began a murder investigation.

On Thursday, police said it had completed a search of a private property at Emer Terrace in Dundalk, where the family lived until May 2024, as well as adjoining land.

A forensic operation at the site began on Tuesday.

The terraced house is about 20 miles north of the town of Drogheda, from where Kyran and his mother were reported missing on 30 August.

His 24-year-old mother, Dayla Durnin, has since been located and therefore is no longer considered a missing person.

When they began the search on Tuesday, gardaí stressed that the current tenants of the house in Emer Terrace were “not connected in anyway with Kyran or his disappearance”.

Gardaí said the results of the search were not being released for operational purposes.

Speaking to the media earlier on Thursday, Commissioner Harris said he was first made aware of Kyran’s case in early September.

“From the very beginning of this investigation, from 30 August, it commenced as a missing persons investigation and then very quickly garda members, their suspicions were aroused, and I was briefed on this in early September and visited the investigation teams,” he said.

Commissioner Harris said gardaí “encourage anyone who might know anything to come forward”.

“What we have worked at is to try and identify proof of life since the last actual sighting in 2022, so I cannot comment specifically on whether Kyran reached his seventh or eighth birthday.”

Although the missing person inquiry began less than two months ago, Irish broadcaster RTÉ previously reported that detectives believe Kyran may have been killed more than two years ago.

It is understood that Kyran attended St Nicholas Monastery national [primary] school until the summer of 2022, but the school told BBC News NI it could not comment on the tragedy during an ongoing investigation.

The Durnin family’s previous contacts with Irish child protection services are now the subject of an independent national review.

Tusla, the state agency responsible for child welfare and protection, has also said it it carrying out an internal review of its interactions with Kyran’s family.

Speaking to RTÉ’s Morning Ireland programme, Justice Minister Helen McEntee said questions have to be asked about how a child could go missing for two years.

McEntee said that anyone found responsible for failures would be held accountable.

Any changes that need to be made with structures in State agencies or laws will also happen, the minister added.

Taoiseach (Irish prime minister) Simon Harris has also expressed his concern over the case, describing it as “utterly horrifying”.

Conor Lally, security and crime editor of The Irish Times, described it as “worrying” that Kyran’s last known school attendance was more than two and a half years ago.

“It does appear from speaking to gardaí sources that, at that stage, the family had floated the idea locally that they were going to relocate to Northern Ireland,” Mr Lally told Good Morning Ulster on Wednesday.

He said the fact that Kyran did not return to school for the start of the following academic year “wouldn’t have really raised any concern because people believed that the family were relocating out of that area”.

BBC News NI has asked Tusla if its staff had been led to believe that the family had moved to Northern Ireland, but the agency declined to answer that question.

Neither the gardaí nor the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) will confirm if any investigations have been carried out in Northern Ireland in relation to Kyran’s disappearance.

The PSNI referred all queries to the gardaí as it is the force leading the investigation, but a garda spokeswoman said she could not “comment on the specifics of any investigative actions”.

• 2021 – 2022 – Kyran was a pupil at a national [primary] school near his home in Dundalk, but he did not return to the school after the 2022 summer holidays.
• May 2024 – Kyran’s family moved out of their home in Emer Terrace in Dundalk, where they had been living for a number of years.
• Unknown date in August 2024 – Tusla, the Irish state agency responsible for child protection, alerted gardaí about “a significant concern about Kyran”.
• 28 August 2024 – The approximate date of the last sighting of the boy and his mother in Drogheda, according to a missing person report made to gardaí.
• 30 August 2024 – Kyran and his 24-year-old mother Dayla Durnin were reported missing from their home in Drogheda.
• 4 September 2024 – Gardaí issued a public missing persons appeal, seeking help to find Dayla and Kyran.
• 16 October 2024 – Gardaí said they now believed that “Kyran is missing, presumed dead” and they confirmed they have begun a murder inquiry.
• 21 October 2024 – Acting under a search warrant, gardaí take possession of the Durnins’ former family home in Emer Terrace, Dundalk.
• 22 October 2024 – a forensic examination of the house, garden and nearby open ground began.