Seán McCárthaigh
A man stabbed his daughter and his son-in-law in a row in their family home in west Dublin before fatally injuring himself in an incident witnessed by his two-year-old granddaughter, an inquest has heard.
Virgil Gherghel (46) was pronounced dead at Connolly Hospital Blanchardstown from a self-inflicted wound to his chest at his home in Ashfield Park, Huntstown, Dublin 15, on October 4th, 2021.
A sitting of Dublin District Coroner’s Court on Tuesday heard evidence that the deceased, a Romanian national, had arrived in Ireland just three months earlier with his wife and son to move in with his married daughter’s family.
Several members of Mr Gherghel’s family explained in written statements read out at the inquest that Mr Gherghel was annoyed that his children had sided with his wife after she had separated from him and moved out of the house in Ashfield Park in the weeks before the fatal incident.
The deceased’s daughter, Bianca Andries, described her father as “a bomb waiting to explode.”
The coroner, Cróna Gallagher, said no members of the Gherghel family had been required to attend the hearing as they remained “extremely traumatised” by the fatal incident.
Ms Andries said her father was annoyed that his wife was working in a nursing home as he felt she could earn more money if she worked with him in a cleaning contract firm.
Although she tried to convince him to return to Romania after her mother had moved out, Ms Andries said her father wanted to stay in Ireland to allow the couple to get back together.
When informed that his wife wanted a divorce, Ms Andries said her father replied: “I am going to kill you, but a divorce is not going to happen.”
Day of incident
She recalled being surprised when her father returned home early from work at around 2pm on October 4th, 2021, but he explained he had a headache.
The inquest heard Ms Andries was in the kitchen of her home preparing dinner while talking to her father when he became angry.
Ms Andries said before she knew what was happening, her father moved towards her and started stabbing her in the chest with a large kitchen knife.
She recalled collapsing on the kitchen floor as she screamed for help and tried to fight off her father who was continuing to try to stab her.
Ms Andries said her father immediately moved toward her husband, Vasile, after he came rushing downstairs with their young daughter in his arms to find out what was happening.
She outlined how she managed to bring the little girl to safety in the back garden but collapsed with her daughter in her arms before passing out and waking up in an ambulance.
‘Very frightening’
Her brother, Cosmin Gherghel, described the scene as “very frightening” and recalled finding Mr Andries lying on a couch in the living room with a stab wound to his neck.
In a statement, Mr Andries said he had offered to help his father-in-law find a new place to live but that Mr Gherghel had insisted that he was going to remain in Ashfield Park so his wife could return.
Mr Andries recounted how he came across Mr Gherghel sitting on top of his daughter on the kitchen floor and stabbing her repeatedly.
He said his father-in-law stabbed him in the hand while saying: “Why did you do this to me?”
He managed to make it back upstairs where he called gardaí and returned to the garden where he found Mr Gherghel, who was still holding the knife in his hand, about 1.5 metres away from Bianca.
Mr Andries said Mr Gherghel stood up and started walking towards him but he managed to get back into the house and locked the door.
The inquest heard that gardaí who arrived on the scene found Mr Gherghel lying on the ground in pools of blood with the knife beside him.
Postmortem results showed he had lost almost two litres of blood as a result of a self-inflicted knife wound to the left side of his chest.
The autopsy confirmed he died of hypovolemic shock due to his injuries.
The inquest heard that Mr Gherghel and his wife had been working together in an abattoir in Germany before they decided to move to Ireland.
In a statement, Ms Gherghel said her husband had visited a doctor while they were in Germany as he had some mental health issues but had stopped taking the medication he had been prescribed.
She described her late partner as being “very controlling” and “threatening” and recalled that he had first slapped her on their wedding day.
Previous arrest
The inquest heard that he had been arrested by police in Germany on New Year’s Day in 2021 after pulling a knife out on his wife in their bedroom.
Ms Gherghel said she had decided around that time that she wanted a divorce as her husband was always threatening her.
“The words ‘I will kill you’ are so normal in my head,” said Ms Gherghel.
However, she subsequently decided to give her marriage another chance as her husband had stopped drinking and was taking his medication again.
Ms Gherghel said the couple, who had been married 25 years, decided to leave Germany as their marital problems resurfaced when her husband again stopped with his medical treatment.
She recalled that everything was OK between them after their arrival in Ireland in July 2021.
However, Ms Gherghel said her husband would not accept the situation after she had decided to leave him and claimed that they would only be separated “through death.”
“He meant my death, but I never thought he would ever do this,” she added.
Ms Gherghel explained that her daughter had helped her to find another place to live but had told her husband that she had gone back to Romania.
She claimed nobody living in their home in Ashfield Park felt safe around her husband as they were frightened of him.
“Everyone in that house was living in terror,” she observed.
Detective Inspector Liam Donoghue told the hearing that the deceased’s wife had contacted gardaí the day before the fatal incident about her concerns about her husband.
He told the coroner that gardaí had no immediate concerns as Ms Gherghel had moved out of the family home and there was no indication that what he described as “a spontaneous attack” was going to happen.
Det Insp Donoghue said it appeared Mr Gherghel suffered from some type of bipolar disorder and had stopped taking his medication.
In reply to questions from the coroner, he said there was no evidence that a third party had inflicted the stab wounds on the deceased.
Det Insp Donoghue said Mr Gherghel’s daughter had made a full recovery from her very serious injuries.
“The fact that she survived at all is a miracle,” he remarked.
Offering her condolences to the Gherghel family on a “very shocking and tragic death,” Dr Gallagher returned a verdict of self-inflicted death.
“I’m sure the trauma from this day will stay with you forever,” she concluded.
