Author: Cynthia Owen

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Fiona Neary Rape Crisis Centre Ireland and to the staff at our local Rape Crisis Centre who supported Simon and I through what was a very difficult time. To Rachel Murphy, my co-writer, thank you for having the patience of a saint and for not pushing me, and most of all for understanding. To the staff at Headline Publishing, in particular Carly Cook and the staff at Hachette Ireland, and my agent Jonathan Conway. And of course to my husband Simon and my son Christopher* - what can I say? It would take a million years to describe the love and loyalty you have both shown me. You taught me how to give and receive love, and how to smile and to learn to trust. The first thing I do each morning when I wake is thank God for both of you.

Cynthia can be contacted through her solicitor at:

Cynthia Owen

c/o Gerry Dunne

O’Brien Dunne Solicitors

6 Upper Fitzwilliam Street

Dublin 2

LETTER TO MY LEGAL TEAM

Dear Gerry, Kieron and Michael,

Many times I have tried to tell you how grateful I am for what you have done for me. So many times I have tried to write it all down but I begin to cry because words cannot describe how I feel about what you have all done.

How can I find the words to say thank you to three men who gave their time so freely, who stood by me so loyally and trusted me so completely? What do I say to three men who didn’t mind walking on a journey with a damaged soul and who gave me strength and picked me up every time I fell?

God knows how many time I promised myself it was over, only to discover you had all been on the phone all evening or working late into the night, and I would tell myself that if you had that much faith in me I must have faith myself.

Gerry, you had to put up with me the most. You had family holidays and kids’ sports days interrupted over and over again through the years, but you never complained. You always reassured me that I was in charge and that this was about ME, which was new to me because as a child it was always about someone else and I had no voice. You gave me back my voice, and in so doing you restored me. I am in no doubt that you saved my life.

As I look back now I see that my healing was in the journey that you three came on with me, walking with me step by step.

At long last I wasn’t alone anymore. I wasn’t that eleven-year-old child having just lost her baby, having witnessed the most horrific crimes imaginable with no one to turn to.

You reached back to me right down through all those years and you kept me going in a world where my siblings gave up and ended their fight to survive. Yet you were always fighting for them too, and you always had them in mind and you fought for all of us.

You helped me to see there are good people in this unjust world, people who really do care and people who want to make a difference. So thank you my guardian angels, my rescuers. You gave me back my life to live, when before I met you I was merely existing.

If you know, or suspect, that a child is being abused please speak out. Remember, whilst you can choose to ignore your suspicions or choose to rescue that child. The child doesn’t have the luxury of choice. Pick up the phone and ring your local Social Services, ISPCC or NSPCC and save that child’s life today. If you have been abused and suspect that the abuser is still a risk to children please consider reporting him/her.

The only way to stop child abuse is to break the silence surrounding it.

‘Evil prospers when good men do nothing’

Edmund Burke

If you need support or want to talk to someone about your own experiences of child sexual abuse The Rape Crisis Centre England and Wales offers support to men and women who have experienced sexual abuse in their childhood and to victims of sexual violence and rape. Their website is http://www.rapecrisis.org.uk/centres.php

Or contact OneinFour, a registered charity that provides support to men and women who have experienced sexual abuse and or sexual violence either as adults or children.

OneinFour Office.

219 Bromley Road Bellingham SE6 2PG

Telephone 02086972112 www.oneinfour.org.uk

Support After Murder and Manslaughter

SAMM

SAMM National

L+DRC, Tally Ho!

Pershore Road

Edgbaston

Birmingham

B5 7RN

0845 872 3440