How can a child fall through the cracks like that.

'Missing Kyran needs full independent review'

- BY MICHAEL O'TOOLE Crime and Defence Editor

A LEADING expert on child protection has demanded an independent review of how Kyran Durnin vanished without a trace.

“There's a real question about how a child can fall through the cracks like that,’ Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC said yesterday - ahead of today’s first anniversary of the little boy being reported missing.

Ms Gallagher, Ireland's Special Rapporteur on Child Protection who oversees State care of kids, says an independent review commissioned by Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, is not enough.

That study, by the National Review Panel, is analysing Tusla’s own internal report into the disappearance of Kyran, reported missing in his native Drogheda, Co Louth on August 30 last year.

Although he was reported missing in 2024, gardai believe he may have been killed as far back as 2022 when he was six.

The National Review Panel examination is separate from the Garda murder investigation into the disappearance of Kyran - who would be nine if he was alive today - but Ms Gallagher wants an independent and transparent examination of the case.

“Kyran Durnin deserves that. The Irish public deserve that, and it hasn't yet happened a year on,’ she told RTE Radio yesterday.

WATERSHED

The highly regarded barrister added: “We are now a year on since Kyran was reported missing in 2024 and, of course, the last confirmed sighting as far as we know was far earlier than that when he was aged six way back in June 2022.