In The News

Tom Phillips, a fugitive father who spent four years hiding in New Zealand’s remote wilderness with his three children was shot dead on Monday by police probing an armed burglary. The children were found unharmed. But why did Phillips disappear in the first place, and how did he manage to evade capture for so long? New Zealand journalist Tony Wall tells the story to Bernice Harrison.  Produce...

Could new technology help to finally reveal who killed Sophie Toscan du Plantier?    After prime suspect Ian Bailey’s death last year, Sophie's uncle Jean-Pierre Gazeau said their family would never get the truth.    But now a Garda cold case team has used new technology, called M-Vac, to harvest DNA from items recovered at the West Cork crime scene. We talk to Jared Bradley, t...

Nearly half of everyone watching Irish TV on Sunday evening tuned in for the scheming, lying and game-playing on The Traitors Ireland. It’s a hit. RTÉ has joined more than 30 broadcasters worldwide in making a version of the Dutch format which sees players strategising, “killing”, banishing and lying – all to win a cash prize. It is hosted brilliantly with more than hint of theatricality by Cork a...

Gardaí are attempting to unravel several conflicting witness accounts of what happened to a boy who went missing four years ago and is feared dead. Searches for the child’s remains in an area of ground in north Dublin are expected to continue for several more days. The boy spent about a year in state care before returning to his family in 2020, with Tusla confirming it had no contact with the...

This week, Britain’s Labour Party returned to Westminster from a summer recess defined by anti-migrant protests, and during which, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK dominated the news agenda. British prime minister Keir Starmer resumed business in parliament by announcing a small reshuffle of his Downing Street team. However, the Labour leader is still facing an array of domestic and foreign policy conundr...

Kathleen Folbigg was convicted over the deaths of her four babies in 2003 in a case that shocked Australia. In 2023 a judicial review found that the babies may have died of a genetic condition and having served nearly two decades in prison she was freed. Her case is now regarded as one of Australia’s greatest miscarriages of justice. In the second episode on the Katheleen Follbig case, McDermot ex...

Kathleen Folbigg was convicted over the deaths of her four babies in 2003 in a case that shocked Australia. The first three were treated as cases of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) but when Laura died, the authorities looked to Meadow’s Law and arrested the grieving mother. That controversial theory held that “one sudden infant death is a tragedy, two is suspicious and three is murder until pr...

Brazilian couple Gil Rudge (39) and Natalia Bonadia (36) rented a room in a shared apartment from Eduardo Gonzaga’s company, Leevin Ireland. All was fine until their landlord advised them that unless they accepted a third person to share their bedroom their rent would have to double. Janiedson da Silva dos Santos was sharing a house with eight others – students rented a bed, not a room – until Lee...

Despite all the talk over the summer, the names that came and went, the speculation and supposition – there is still only one name confirmed for the presidential race. Catherine Connolly, who launched her candidacy early with the support of Labour, the Soc Dems and others will be on the ballot paper. She will be joined by other presidential hopefuls – that much is certain – but who? Today in The I...

This podcast was first published in June 2025. The use of so-called 'dodgy box' technology to illegally stream television is widespread. Last week Mary Hannigan reported on the impact dodgy boxes are having on Irish sports broadcasters like Clubber, LOITV and GAA+. “I said it before, it’s no different to going in to your local shop, picking up a loaf of bread or a bottle of milk and just walking o...

In the space of a few short years, generative AI has exploded into our daily lives, impacting the way we learn, work and understand the world around us. Open AI, the American artificial intelligence company cofounded by Sam Altman and Elon Musk in 2015 which runs ChatGPT, claims its non-profit “mission” is to ensure these systems “benefit all of humanity”. And while the launch of ChatGPT has undou...

For years the Irish Republican Brotherhood – the IRB – was remembered annually in a curious ceremony at Dublin’s Mansion House when its self-styled president Billy McGuire conducted a ritual that involved turning a golden harp to reaffirm the sovereignty of Ireland. The existence of an IRB will come as a surprise to historians who consider that the secret-oath-bound society of the same name was di...

The arrest of more than 500 people at a Palestine Action rally in London on August 9th did more than raise the profile of the little-known anti-war action group: it raised questions about the fundamental right of British people to engage in peaceful protest, and exactly what constitutes a terrorist organisation in the eyes of the government. The arrests were on foot of a ban in July under UK terro...

This episode was originally published in June 2025. Tattle Life is a gossip site that many will have never heard of until a landmark defamation trial in Belfast in June 2025. Donna and Neil Sands bought a defamation case against the site – and won. They were each awarded £150,000 (€176,000) in damages, with the court saying their costs should also be covered. The married couple who live in Norther...

In the 12 months leading up to April 2024, 30,000 Irish citizens who had been living abroad returned to Ireland. A similar number of Irish emigrants returned to Irish shores the previous year, in the 12 months leading up to April 2023. Who are these people, why are they coming home and what do they think of the Ireland they've returned to? Today, on the In the News podcast, we speak to three Irish...

The Rose of Tralee is one of the biggest events in Ireland’s cultural calendar. It pumps millions of euro into the local economy and pulls in well over half a million viewers; no mean feat in an age of dwindling linear TV viewership. Almost 30 years of being lampooned as a ‘Lovely Girls’ competition thanks to that Father Ted episode has seen its popularity undimmed. Albeit only relatively recently...

In 2021, GP Paddy Davern returned to Ireland after eight years working as a doctor in Qatar. Four years on, the Tipperary man is still struggling to come to terms with the time he spent working with the Special Operations Service (SOS), a specialist medical team treating the country’s royals and other VIPs. In today’s episode, Irish Times health correspondent Shauna Bowers shares Dr Davern's traum...

The prescription of pain medication among Irish patients, including highly addictive opioids, is rapidly rising, according to new research. The use of opioids has increased by 25 per cent in Ireland, while the prescription of paracetamol rose 50 per cent between 2014-2022, according to a study published last week in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology. The prescription of even stronger me...

Last week, in the early hours of Tuesday, August 5th, Martha Nolan-O’Slattara was found unconscious on a boat at an exclusive yacht club in the Hamptons. She was later pronounced dead by first responders. The 33-year-old entrepreneur from Co Carlow had been living in the United States for nearly a decade where she had set a series of pop-up clothes boutiques and lived in Manhattan’s upper east sid...

Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu has continued to defend his government’s plan to escalate the war in Gaza, despite widespread international condemnation and outrage. The Israeli leader claims his security cabinet’s decision to capture Gaza City, which could mean months, possibly years, of combat ahead, is “the best way to end the war, and the best way to end it speedily”. The plan has re...

In the heart of Limerick city sits a newly-built six storey landmark, offered as a gift by JP McManus to Limerick City and County Council. The billionaire businessman had a vision for an iconic tourist attraction in the southwest, offering a boost to the area and honouring Ireland's proud rugby tradition. The International Rugby Experience opened to great fanfare in May 2023, but was shuttered jus...

Seven years ago, in September 2018, the Government approached a company called Brimwood Ltd asking for help to secure extra accommodation in hotels and B & Bs for asylum seekers. While the number of international protection applicants arriving in Ireland was significantly lower at that time when compared with today – nearly 6,000 in 2018 compared with almost 33,000 in 2025 – the State’s direct...

British socialite Constance Marten, 38, and her partner convicted rapist Mark Gordon, 51, prompted a 53-day police manhunt when they went on the run with their newborn daughter in the depths of winter two years ago. That hunt ended in tragedy after the decomposed body of their baby, Victoria, was discovered in a shopping bag buried under rubbish in Brighton; the couple were camping nearby. While n...

British socialite Constance Marten, 38, and her partner convicted rapist Mark Gordon, 51, prompted a 53-day police manhunt when they went on the run with their newborn daughter in the depths of winter two years ago. That hunt ended in tragedy after the decomposed body of their baby, Victoria, was discovered in a shopping bag buried under rubbish in Brighton; the couple were camping nearby. While n...

Kerry farmer Michael Gaine’s disappearance on March 20th was first treated as a missing person’s case. Soon though, it was upgraded to a murder investigation as the Garda searched for his body and explored multiple lines of inquiry. Then the farmer’s body was found – in the most grisly of circumstances. He had been dismembered with his body parts deposited into the silage pit on his farm. One such...