GARDAÍ INVESTIGATING the murder of 12-year-old Michaela Davis say there may have been a possible sexual element to her killing.
She had been strangled and her partially clothed body dumped in hedging and undergrowth on the banks of the Royal Canal close to her home in Porterstown, west Dublin.
A postmortem revealed she had also sustained head injuries.
Gardaí believe Michaela, who started secondary school last week, had recently befriended a group of teenagers much older than her from the local area.
One line of investigation is that the teenage boys and young men had tried to involve her in sexually abusive behaviour, possibly on the promise of rewards such as cigarettes and alcohol.
A 19-year-old man presented himself to gardaí at Blanchardstown Garda station with his father at 8pm on Saturday and was arrested for questioning.
The investigation is fixed on a definite line of inquiry and is said to be progressing “very well”. The teenager was being questioned under suspicion of assault but the investigation is a full murder inquiry.
Michaela was a first-year student at Luttrellstown Community College in Blanchardstown, having attended her first classes last Wednesday.
She was out with friends in the area close to her home on Friday evening and returned home that night. However, just after midnight she told her parents, Brendan and Deirdre, she was going out to meet a friend, saying she would not be long.
When she failed to return home by 2.30am her parents became concerned and contacted gardaí. A major Garda search operation was put in place in the area which involved the Garda helicopter.
Gardaí also called to the homes of some of Michaela’s friends in the hope she might be with one of them or they might have information as to her whereabouts.
The Garda investigation continued throughout Saturday. At around 3.50pm an elderly man out walking his dog on the banks of the Royal Canal, less than a kilometre from Michaela’s home, saw a leg sticking out of bushes on a steep bank between the rail line and a walkway along the canal.
He rang gardaí and when they arrived at the scene minutes later they found Michaela’s body. The area was sealed off and the State Pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy carried out a preliminary examination at the scene on Saturday night.
The girl’s body was then removed and a full postmortem carried out yesterday found that Michaela had been strangled.
Gardaí are working on the theory that Michaela left her house in the early hours of Saturday to meet somebody. It is not clear if she was killed where she was found but gardaí found her bicycle at a second location, close to where her body was discovered.
Supt Gilligan said it was a very difficult time for the victim’s family, friends and the local community but reassured residents in the Dublin suburb that the attack was an isolated incident.
He said anybody with information should contact the Gardaí. “Small pieces of information sometimes can assist us with a larger investigation,” he added.