The mother of Jastine Valdez, who was strangled after being kidnapped in Co Wicklow in May, has said her pain was not eased by knowing that her daughter’s murderer died shortly after he killed her.
The 24-year-old went missing while she was walking to her home in Enniskerry, on Saturday 19 May.
Mark Hennessy, a 40-year-old father of two children, who lived in Bray, Co Wicklow kidnapped Ms Valdez and strangled her.
He was shot dead after an interaction with gardaí at Cherrywood Business Park on Sunday 20 May.
Jastine had joined her parents, Danilo and Teresito, in Ireland in June 2015 after they had earlier moved here to work.
Speaking through an interpreter on RTÉ’s Today with Miriam, Teresito Valdez said knowing that Hennessy was killed did not matter as Jastine was gone.
The couple said they felt bad that he was dead as they wanted to know what was going through his head, and to know more about why he killed Jastine.
They said they were quite disappointed that he was killed so quickly because they had a lot of questions about what happened and "why he did such a terrible thing."
Mrs Valdez said they never got to say goodbye to Jastine as she was sleeping when they left the house on the day she was kidnapped. Their last communication was a text message but they never got to say a proper goodbye.
After the murder, they questioned God because they felt that when they needed him the most, to protect their child, he was not there.
The couple, who are Catholics, said they prayed a lot but were hurting because they were left in pain.
They said they were not angry with Ireland for what happened to Jastine because whatever was going on in Hennessy’s mind was only in his mind and they could not blame Ireland as the country had been good to them.
The Valdezs thanked the Filipino-Irish community and the Irish people for all the help they received in the aftermath of their loss.
They said they will always feel indebted to people and could never repay their kindness.
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
Mr and Mrs Valdez went back to their native Philippines with their daughter’s remains for burial.
A Go Fund Me page was set up, which helped with the costs of Jastine’s repatriation. The fund surpassed the initial target of €10,000 and ultimately raised €140,000.
Most of this money was spent on the repatriation, as well as a traditional wake and funeral in the Philippines, which lasts for a month.
A few weeks after Jastine was buried, her parents found a letter addressed to them in her belongings.
In it, their daughter said she did not have the words to express how much she loved them and she thanked them for helping her through the trials that she had overcome in her life.
The Valdezs have returned to Ireland and are trying to restart their life. However, they now have no home and no longer have jobs.
Mrs Valdez said she and her husband were living in someone else’s home but she hopes they get jobs soon and can find their own home.
She said she would take any job that was available but Mr Valdez said he was not yet ready to return to work as he was too stressed and still distraught about what happened to his daughter. He said he needed more time to recover.
The interview with the couple was the only one they said they would be doing and they appealed for privacy as they try to rebuild their lives.
