There have been several recent documentaries about the suspected murders of a number of women in Ireland in the mid-1990s and the potential involvement of convicted kidnapper and rapist Larry Murphy – dubbed “the beast of Baltinglass” by the tabloids. Colette Camden’s Six Silent Killings: Ireland’s Vanishing Triangle (Sky Documentaries, 9pm) is different in that it brings a British perspective. One question Camden considers is whether misogyny in Irish society resulted in the disappearance of American Annie McCarrick, one of the first of the young women to go missing, not initially being taken as seriously as it might have been.
British filmmakers tackling Irish subject matter often bring their own biases. You only have to look at the dreadful Woman in the Wall. The BBC drama turned the evils of the Mother and Baby Homes and the Magdalene Laundries into a gothic lark with bass notes of Father Ted.
In the case of Six Silent Killings, an Irish viewer might remark that it’s a bit rich of Sky to bang on about issues within Irish policing. What about the well-documented problems of institutional misogyny within the London Met? Why isn’t Sky making a documentary about that?
That being said, McCarrick’s mother, Nancy, surely has a point when she says that her daughter’s disappearance in March 1993 was only taken seriously when “the men got involved”. As soon as Annie’s father, John, flew in from Long Island, attitudes changed. “It was different when the men came,” says Nancy. “They took the men more seriously. It was all geared towards what men thought.”
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Camden circles back to that point when the film moves on to Deirdre Jacob. The student teacher vanished from near her home in Newbridge in July 1998. Her disappearance, like that of McCarrick, has never been solved. A trainee teacher from what people would at the time have described as a good family: this sort of person didn’t just vanish. Irish society immediately brought all its resources to bear in trying to find her. “She wasn’t a foreigner, she wasn’t going out late at night,” says journalist Geraldine Niland, who reported extensively on the cases. “The disappearance of Deirdre Jacob changed everything.”
Six Silent Killings is well made. It makes imaginative use of drone technology – the favourite gimmick of contemporary documentarians. The Wicklow Mountains, as filmed from above, become a purgatorial hell. They resemble something from True Detective or Twin Peaks. “It’s beautiful but bleak in a way,” says one local. “Plenty of areas are ideal for doing something you don’t want others to see.”
In addition to Annie McCarrick and Deirdre Jacob, Camden considers the disappearances of Josephine Dullard, Fiona Pender, Ciara Breen and Fiona Sinnott. All vanished within an 80-mile radius of what Niland described as the Vanishing Triangle.
This is, by necessity, grim viewing. It gets even grimmer with the arrival into the narrative of Larry Murphy in part two. These disappearances have never been solved, and so, as of now, there will be no peace for their families. How haunting to consider that all of these women would today be in their 40s and 50s. How terrible to reflect on the futures they never lived, the opportunities they never had, the lives they never touched.
Six Silent Killings avoids true crime sensationalism – heaven help us if Netflix ever turns its attention to these disappearances. You can quibble whether misogyny played a pivotal part in the official response to the disappearances – though Camden is undoubtedly correct to at least ask the question. Either way, this is a thoughtful and respectful documentary worth watching, even for the many Irish people already horribly familiar with the cases.
