The nightmare scenario for gardaí investigating the unexplained death of Dublin boy Daniel Aruebose is that, having found remains believed to be his, the postmortem examination will prove inconclusive.
In that case, the child’s cause of death will never be known. And it will never be determined if foul play was a factor, certainly not by forensic pathology to the standard needed for a prosecution.
On Thursday night, under cover of darkness, an undertaker’s van arrived at Daniel’s burial site – a field in Donabate, north Dublin – and removed partial remains for postmortem. Through the day, the skeletal remains, which have degraded significantly in the ground over the past four years, were examined by pathologists and exhumed.
“There was very little of him left,” said a Garda source.
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The Garda’s approach to the people treated as witnesses to date will now become much more direct and pressured in what is a new phase of the investigation.
Two state pathologists, Dr Heidi Okkers and Dr Yvonne McCarthy, worked at the site through Thursday, with specialist forensic archaeologist Niamh McCullagh also present.
Gardaí stressed the remains were the “subject of careful and sensitive exhumation”. Gardaí also combed the area around where the discovery was made, clearly anxious not to leave behind any other evidence. As well as the degraded bones, clothes that Daniel was wearing and other items were also discovered there.
One Garda source said it was “really crucial” that any items linked to Daniel and his burial were not missed. “That kind of evidence might give you a link to a suspect or even a witness; maybe DNA, a strand of hair, fingerprints, anything like that. That could be more valuable than anything the pathologists might be able to get from a postmortem.”
As the gardaí investigative work and forensic pathology unfolded at the burial site, that activity was shielded from the public by a forensic tent and canvas screens erected there.
All the while, the community of Donabate was digesting the news a boy, aged three and a half, who had lived among them died, or was killed, four years ago before his body was taken to the field off Portrane Road and buried there.
At the gates of a property situated at one of three entrances to the site, people left candles, cards, flowers and soft toys with messages for Daniel. “Sleep in peace little Daniel, the angels will take care of you now,” read one. Visitors to the location, which has become a shrine to Daniel, expressed sadness, shock and incredulity. They spoke of their “devastation” and “heartbreak” at what has happened.
But what exactly did happen to Daniel Aruebose? What do we know at this stage?
Daniel was the son of a mixed race couple, born on December 12th, 2017, in the Rotunda Hospital, Dublin. His parents were living in a middle class suburb of north Dublin at the time.
His father, who worked as a labourer when Daniel was born, is an Irishman, from the west of Ireland. His mother, who came to Ireland as a child from an African nation, grew up in Munster and is an Irish citizen. They have not been a couple for at least the last six years, though remained in close contact long after their relationship ended. More recently, Daniel’s father has spent long periods abroad and is now married and has worked at times in the courier business.
When Daniel was born, his parents decided to given him up for adoption. It appears their life at the time was, at best, unsettled, and they lived in shared accommodation.
[ How can a child just disappear without the State even noticing?Opens in new window ]
Daniel was placed with a foster family on the day he was born and remained with them for a year. His parents then had a change of heart about putting him up for adoption and Daniel was returned to them. For the next six months, he still spent some periods of time with the foster family; an apparent effort to offer respite to his parents.
Tusla, the child and family agency, oversaw all of those developments. The agency was involved with the family from the period just before Daniel’s birth until 2020, when he was a two-year-old. Daniel lived in a family setting in The Gallery apartment complex in Donabate when he was returned to his parents.
What happened next is still under investigation by the Garda and other authorities, including the National Review Panel, which is reviewing Tusla’s work. But gardaí believe Daniel died, or was killed, when he was aged about three years old in 2021, and his remains taken to the field in Donabate and buried there.
Nobody seemed to notice he was gone. His disappearance does not appear to have been reported by anyone to the Garda or Tusla or any other agency.
But last month, officials at the Department of Social Protection made checks on a social welfare payment, related to Daniel, that was being claimed. Staff were unable to secure any proof of his whereabouts and became suspicious. Late last month they alerted Tusla, which went to the Garda.
An investigation was commenced, with gardaí contacting Daniel’s parents and others who knew him. Unusually, solid information began to flow. Gardaí were told Daniel was dead and that his body was buried in the field in Donabate, which was sealed off on September 1st. The people who supplied that information also claimed the boy died in his sleep, of natural causes, one night. They claimed when efforts to revive him failed, he was buried in the ensuing panic.
It seems an unlikely scenario. Why not dial 999, for example? Gardaí have not accepted any version of events relayed to them so far and are investigating everything with an open mind.
However, at least some of the information supplied to gardaí by the people who claim Daniel died of natural causes has proven accurate. They told gardaí he was buried in the field and guided them, via multiple consultations and visits to the site, to the precise location where the remains lay.
That search, involving excavation using diggers over a large area, continued for more than two weeks. However, the tragic find was eventually made very close to the precise location pointed out to gardaí at the start of the process, and where the first excavations took place.
The site is marshy land, with a pond that acts as drainage for water coming off two roads bordering the field. Because children are smaller, and their bones are less dense and more porous, than those of adults, their remains decompose much more quickly.
A study by scientists at North Carolina State University found juvenile remains that were buried decomposed at a faster rate than remains wrapped in plastic or exposed to the elements. This was because the bones were “broken down by microbes that were already in the body” as well as “microbes in the soil”. The process was fastest for remains buried in moist soil, like that where the bones were discovered.
At the time of writing on Friday, the postmortem on the remains, believed to be Daniel’s, had not been completed. But gardaí were very pessimistic a cause of death – and a conclusive finding of foul play, or not – could be determined.
However, Garda sources said even if the postmortem is inconclusive, the discovery of the body is a big development. It also means that even if foul play is ruled out, a number of people could still face charges around their failure to report Daniel’s death and for unauthorised disposal of his remains.
The fact the body was found at the location pointed out to gardaí by people who knew him also implicates those people, at the very least, in concealing his death and disposing of his remains. If the postmortem – or the follow-up tests, scans and expert consultations – uncovers foul play, a much more straightforward homicide inquiry will be conducted. And the people who were able to lead gardaí to the body will be of intense interest to detectives.
“The next phase is really leaning on the people who’ve claimed he died of natural causes,” said one source. “It’s been a softer approach (to date), to try and get the information out of them so we’d find the body. But now you have to press them and press them hard.”
