The mum of twin boys stabbed to death by their brother has told how she can’t afford their funeral costs.
Tragic Thomas and Patrick O’Driscoll were knifed as they changed out of their school uniforms in Charleville, Cork, in September.
Within an hour, older brother Jonathan, 21, fostered by the O’Driscolls as a youngster, was found hanged near a riverbank in a horrific murder-suicide.
Now their devastated mum Helen has revealed that she has been given a €13,000 bill for their funerals,equivalent to Ksh.1,839,888.05 reports the Irish Mirror.
But in an interview with TV3 News on what should have been their 10th birthdays, Helen has admitted that she will be unable to cover the cost.
“There are days where you sit down and look out the window and you say to yourself ‘why?’
“Why was it done to me?
"Not only have I lost my three children I have lost my home,” she said.
Thomas had travelled to Waterford on September 5 to buy the twin boys a handmade miniature wagon.
They had been collected from school by adopted brother Jonathan who brought them to a local park before knifing them to death as they changed in their bedrooms.
Mum Helen arrived home to the horrific news.
Along with her husband, and their three remaining children, she has been living in a caravan alongside their home.
They say they are unable to return to the house of horrors and have asked the county council to build them a new home.
Today the twins should be celebrating their 10th birthday.
“I didn’t just lose one son, I lost three of them,” said Helen.
“If I had them again I would put my arms around them, never let them go.
"I would hug them and kiss them.
“When you hold a birthday party for a child you would say ‘I’ll leave off this little thing until next year, I’ll do something else the next time’.
“If I had my boys back I would never let go of them because you never know what tomorrow brings.
"And for me it’s after bringing nothing but heartbreak to tell you the truth.
“I love them so much and I waited 17 years for them.
"I just wish God gave them back to me.”
Jonathan, who was on bail for a knife offence at the time, was described as a private young man.
Adopted when he was a youngster, he had been struggling with not knowing who his biological parents were.
He was also seeking to be adopted by Helen and Thomas but the mum explained that they were encountering difficulties with this.
photo:becuo.com