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Irish man acquitted of Romani girl's 2008 murder, case unresolved

03 November 2014
2 minute read

Irish media have reported that Alan Wilson, a Dublin resident charged with murdering Mariora Rostas, a Romani 18-year-old, in 2008, was found not guilty by a unanimous jury verdict this summer. Wilson’s defense attorneys told the jury they were being asked to rely on the evidence of an unreliable witness who had benefited from immunity from prosecution for his own involvement in the matter.

Mariora Rostas was last seen alive begging on Lombard Street in Dublin in January 2008. Her body was found buried in the Wicklow Mountains in 2012; she had been shot four times in the head.

Witness Fergus O’Hanlon told the jury he helped Wilson dispose of Mariora’s body. O’Hanlon had been arrested on suspicion of witholding evidence about the crime in 2008; after being arrested in 2011 on a separate matter, he told police he did have information about the Romani girl’s disappearance.

According to Irish media reports, Marioara Rostas had only been in Ireland for 18 days when she was abducted and murdered. She had arrived from western Romania in December 2007 to join her family, who were living in an abandoned bungalow on the outskirts of Donabate in northern County Dublin.

Her 15-year-old brother said that on the day in question, they were begging in Dublin when a man pulled up and convinced Mariora to get in his car, giving the brother 10 euro and saying he was taking her to get a McDonald’s meal for them both. He never saw his sister again.

During her captivity, Marioara managed to get access to a mobile phone and called another relative in Romania. She told him she had been raped by her captors and read out the letters of a street sign she could partially see from a window.  

Her body was eventually buried in a forest and was not found until almost 1 500 days later. Now Alan Wilson has been acquitted of her murder and it is doubtful the case will be reopened.

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