The coroner in a murder-suicide in north Cork said the case was a tragedy “beyond comprehension”.
The inquest found 26-year-old Mark O’Sullivan was unlawfully killed, while his father Tadgh and younger brother Diarmuid took their own lives.
“This is the trail of destruction from your solicitor’s letter.”
Words to that effect were the last which 23-year-old Diarmuid O’Sullivan spoke to his mother Anne.
Just moments after she saw him and his father, Tadgh, fire gunshots into older brother Mark’s bedroom.
After Anne was diagnosed with terminal cancer in February 2020, there was a row over an inheritance.
Anne wanted to split her farmland in Kanturk equally between Mark and Diarmuid.
But Diarmuid wanted the entire farm to be left to him, with Tadgh on his side.
Relations between the family members broke down, with Anne staying at a cousin’s house with Mark in the 2 weeks just before the shooting.
There was an exchange of legal letters over Anne’s will, which was changed shortly before her death.
A garda who spoke to Anne after the shooting said Diarmuid referenced this after firing into Mark’s room.
Coroner Dr Michael Kennedy said it was hard to make sense of the incident, and called it a tragedy.
