Irish police investigating the death of Ashling Murphy have arrested a man in his 30s on suspicion of murder.
Murphy, a primary school teacher, was strangled on a canal path near the town of Tullamore while out jogging last Wednesday afternoon. Her funeral was held on Tuesday.
He was arrested at a Dublin hospital where he presented last Thursday with unexplained injuries, some of them self-inflicted.
He was reportedly taken into custody on Tuesday morning after authorities judged that he had recovered sufficiently to face questions at Tullamore garda station, where the investigation into the fatal assault is taking place.
Police said they had arrested a man on suspicion of murder.
“Gardaí investigating the fatal assault on Ashling Murphy that occurred at approximately 4pm on Wednesday, 12 January, 2022, along the canal bank at Cappincur, Tullamore, County Offaly have arrested a male in his 30s on suspicion of murder,” a statement said.
“The male is now detained in Tullamore garda station under section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act 1984. An Garda Síochána has no further comment at this time.”
The man can be questioned for 24 hours after which he must be charged or released.
According to reports in Ireland the man arrested has links with Offaly and south Dublin but has also lived abroad. Gardaí refused to comment on reports by Irish national broadcaster RTÉ that the man in custody was a father of young children.
On Monday, the garda said “significant progress” was being made in the murder investigation, as they renewed their appeal for information.
They asked that anyone who saw a man dressed in a black tracksuit top with no hood, black tracksuit bottoms with a large white stripe or white writing on the side and black trainers to come forward.
DNA gathered at the scene will be critical to the investigation. Two houses have been sealed off for forensic examination.
Other forensic evidence has been gathered from a Falcon Storm mountain bike abandoned at the crime scene.
On Monday gardaí removed a bottle bank from a recycling location less than a mile from the scene of the crime and on Tuesday police were seen dismantling a clothes bank at a separate location near Tullamore.
Murphy’s death has shocked the nation and led to vigils attended by tens of thousands of people in Dublin, Cork, Belfast, London and New York over the weekend.
Like the murder of Sarah Everard in the UK last year, it has reignited the debate about safety of women as they go about their everyday business.
At her funeral on Tuesday, the Bishop of Meath, Thomas Deenihan, told mourners “a depraved act of violence” that deprived Murphy of her life had united the country in grief and support and said her killing had asked questions of “ourselves and of society”, as well as questioning attitudes towards women.
“Whether those questions will be addressed or passed over remains to be seen but we cannot allow such violence and disregard for both human life and bodily integrity to take root in our time and culture,” he said.
Bishop Deenihan said one light in last week’s darkness was the outpouring of support and sympathy.
In a statement on Tuesday, Murphy’s boyfriend Ryan Casey described her as an “incredible, loving and beautiful person”
He said: “Ashling was so much more to me than a girlfriend, she was my soulmate, she is my soulmate, she will always be my soulmate. She is the greatest love of my life. I will cherish the last five years we spent together my entire life.”
