Hi °C | Lo °C FOR five years the French family have maintained a dignified silence.
Yesterday, standing side-by-side in the spring sunshine, mother Janet, father John and sister Jill spoke about their beautiful, caring and loving daughter who had often been held up as a 'poster girl' for the dangers of drug taking in the years since her tragic death.
"For five years we watched Katy being slandered, torn apart, being used as a flagship for so-called drug taking," said her father John, struggling with his emotions.
"Not once has anybody pointed out that while she admitted to it, she was trying to clean herself up, trying to show the way."
Tests show the model had half a glass of wine and 0.8mg of cocaine in her system along with traces of antibiotics for a kidney infection, cough medicine and contraceptives.
Yet, her family pointed out it had been frequently "insinuated" she had taken a 'cocktail of drugs'. "She wasn't on a binge drink, that was pretty obvious despite what people say. That came out in the court," he added.
Perhaps, her father suggested, now is the time to let her rest and to look at the other side of Katy, pictured, such as her kindness and trusting nature.
Her mother, Janet, who has compiled a list of unanswered questions about her daughter's death, described Katy as the "light of my life".
Resilient, encouraging, enlightening and most of all fun. Those were the words that sprung to Janet's mind to recall her late daughter.
For the past five years, her sister Jill said each family member had been living "without a part of ourselves".
Her mother told how they had listened in the court as both Kieron Ducie and Ann Corcoran were depicted as "positive angels", while the only "good word" spoken about their daughter had been by the judge.
Jill said Ducie was not Katie's friend but she had encountered him and been photographed alongside him, like others, as he frequented the social scene. He had not been on the list of her friends and family for her 24th birthday party in Krystle.
After listening to court evidence showing a time gap of an hour-and-a-half between the model being discovered in difficulties on the bedroom floor around 8.30am and a phone call to emergency services at 10.05am, her family said they were "extremely distressed" by the decisions taken by Ducie and Corcoran.
Failure
"We question the extent to which their failure to call an ambulance showed misplaced priorities and a lack of care and responsibility," said Jill.
Her family said they had simply wanted to show Katy in the "positive light she deserves" and tell of their anguish, that after five years, they still do not fully know what happened to her. And, as they left the courthouse car park in Trim, Co Meath, her mother was still tightly clutching her lengthy list of unanswered questions.
Irish Independent
