Sergeant tells court he saw ‘look’ between accused boys when asked where they last saw Ana Kriegel

A sergeant has testified that he observed a ‘look’ or ‘glance’ between the two boys accused of murdering Anastasia Kriegel when they were showing gardaí where they claimed they’d last seen her.

Sergeant tells court he saw ‘look’ between accused boys when asked where they last saw Ana Kriegel

A sergeant has testified that he observed a ‘look’ or ‘glance’ between the two boys accused of murdering Anastasia Kriegel when they were showing gardaí where they claimed they’d last seen her.

Ana's father earlier described seeing his 14-year-old daughter walking away from their home with one of the boys accused of her murder 20 minutes before her phone tried to call her mother’s office, and half an hour before the State believes she was dead.

Patric Kriegel knew that she meant it when she told him that she ‘wouldn’t be long’. She was happy and had ‘a big smile’. However, his wife was ‘immediately concerned’ when she learned that Ana had left home with this boy.

They were giving evidence to the Central Criminal Court today on the second day of the trial of two teenagers charged with murdering the Kildare schoolgirl.

Mr Kriegel told Brendan Grehan SC, prosecuting, that he looked at his watch as they walked away. It was 5pm. It’s the State’s case that she was dead by 5.32pm, when her phone was last active. The prosecution argues that the boy her father saw had lured her from her home to a dirty, derelict farmhouse, where he voyeuristically watched the other boy sexually assault and murder her.

The two teenagers are charged with murdering Anastasia at Glenwood House, Laraghcon, Clonee Road, Lucan on May 14 last year. The accused, who are both 14, cannot be named because they are minors. They each pleaded not guilty.

Boy A is further charged with Anastasia’s aggravated sexual assault in a manner that involved serious violence to her. He also pleaded not guilty to that count.

Anastasia Kriegel’s parents Geraldine and Patric.
Anastasia Kriegel’s parents Geraldine and Patric.

Mr Kriegel said that his daughter had begun walking while listening to music in the evenings once they had become brighter. She would never leave the house without her blue headphones and she knew that there was a strict rule not to be out after dark.

“She loved listening to music. She loved walking. Sometimes she’d go for an hour and half,” he recalled. “At that stage, I could know where she was. We have an app, Find my iPhone. We could see exactly where she was. But she left the family sharing from the app and then I couldn’t see where she was.”

This inability to see her location was how things stood when she went missing.

He recalled being out in the back garden when he heard the doorbell ring at 4.55pm that day. He heard the door open and made his way to the hall. He hadn’t expected it to be for Ana, as nobody ever called for her. The trial has already heard that she was a loner.

“I did see Ana at the front door talking to somebody but she was whispering,” he said. “I think a lot of teenagers seem to whisper quite a lot.”

He said that she went back upstairs very quickly and came back down with her distinctive black hoodie.

“I said: ‘Ana, you know you are supposed to study’, because she had exams the next week,” he recalled. “She said: ‘Oh, nobody told me that’. I said: ‘Ok, but don’t be long’. She said, ‘No, I won’t be long’ and I believe that she meant it. I knew from the way she said: ‘No, I won’t be long’, that she meant exactly that.”

She gave me a big smile when she left. She was happy.

“I had forgotten to ask her where she was going,” he explained. “Normally I would ask.”

So he looked out the front window and saw her walking towards the local park with a boy, now known to be Boy B.

He checked his watch and it was five o’clock.

Mr Grehan later showed him a still from CCTV footage, capturing them walking away one minute later. He identified his daughter in the still, walking a number of paces behind Boy B.

“It appears that they’re not talking to each other as well, because of the distance between them,” remarked Mr Kriegel.

His wife, Geraldine Kriegel, had earlier described their daughter as ‘very immature, a child on the inside’.

“On the outside she looked older and liked to wear makeup, but inside she was far younger than her years,” she told Mr Grehan.

She explained that she didn't have particular friends, apart from her cousins and another girl adopted from Russia.

“She really wanted to have her own friends,” she said, explaining that she had eventually made a friend.

“That was really special to her,” she said. “I was really happy for her because she needed that.”

However, Ana was very happy at home and loved her family, she said.

Mrs Kriegel became upset when asked to describe the day Ana had gone missing.

“I woke her and I kissed her goodbye,” she said, recalling that it was 8.15am.

Mrs Kriegel had also written her a note so that she could leave school early that afternoon to attend her weekly counselling session. She knew from her husband, who had retired, that she had gone to the counselling as planned that day.

“She tried to phone me at three and four minutes past four, but I was in the middle of a meeting so I texted her to say I’d phone her as soon as I could,” she continued.

She explained that her daughter used to phone her all the time and that they were always in touch.

She had tried to phone Ana from the train home from work around 5.10pm, but it went through to voicemail.

Mrs Kriegel arrived home 10 minutes later and went out to her husband in the back garden.

“It was a beautiful day, very sunny, very warm,” she recalled.

She asked where their daughter was and he told her that she had left with Boy B.

“I said what was she doing with (him). He has nothing to do with her. Nobody calls for Ana. I was immediately concerned,” she said. “She had no friends. I couldn't understand.”

She said that it was so unusual that she was worried.

“I texted her and said just two words: ‘Home now’,” she said.

This was about 5.25pm, and she received no answer.

“We were so worried, I texted her again: ‘Answer me now or I’m calling the police’,” she continued.

I was in between feeling like a paranoid mother, overprotective, and then being terrified.

She got no response and left the house immediately, walking in the direction her husband had seen Ana go. Having no luck on foot, the couple later searched further afield by car. She also went onto Facebook to find the surname of Boy B.

They ultimately reported her missing to Leixlip Gardaí shortly after 9pm. She described Ana to gardaí as a communicator, who would ‘always’ respond, even if annoyed with her.

“She’d answer me back to say I’m not answering you,” she remarked.

For her not to respond sounded serious alarm bells.

“I was terrified,” she said.

“She always brought her headphones with her and they were at home,” she continued. “She’d no money.”

She said that the gardaí quickly located Boy B’s home and that both the family and gardaí spent the following days searching for her daughter.

She saw two boys in the park with the gardaí the next day. She recognised Boy B, but not the other boy.

“He was limping very badly,” she said of this boy.

It is the State’s case that Boy A sustained this limp during the struggle with Ana.

She agreed that the garda liaison officer contacted her on May 17 and informed her that a girl’s body had been found in a derelict house in Lucan. She and her husband travelled to Dublin City Morgue the following day to identify their daughter’s remains.

Mr Grehan asked her to identify a phone number found in her daughter’s phone records after her disappearance. The Dublin number had been rung by Ana’s phone at 5.20pm on the day she went missing.

“That’s my boss,” she said, confirming that it was her work number.

Sergeant says Boy A gave Boy B 'a look'

Sgt John Dunne, from Leixlip Garda Station, told Mr Grehan that he called to the home of Boy B on the morning of Tuesday, May 15, the day after Ana went missing.

In the presence of his mother, Boy B told Sgt Dunne that he’d called to Ana the evening before on behalf of his friend Boy A. He told Sgt Dunne that Ana was fond of Boy A but Boy A was not interested in having a relationship with her.

He told Sgt Dunne, according to the garda, that he walked with Ana into St Catherine’s park and met Boy A.

He stated that the meeting was arranged by Boy A to let Ana know he wasn’t interested in her. He said that he and Ana met Boy A in the park and Boy A and Ana had their conversation and that was it. They then went home.

Sgt Dunne said Boy B led him on the route Boy B said he had walked with Ana.

He said Boy B pointed out where he had seen Boy A and pointed out where they had met.

Afterwards, Sgt Dunne said, Boy B told him that Ana went north, Boy A went south and Boy B went off to see his grandmother.

Later, Sgt Dunne said he, Sgt Aonghus Hussey, Boy B, Boy A and Boy A’s father started walking the route together.

Sgt Dunne said the two boys were leading them. They walked on the opposite side of a hedge, Boy B had shown the garda earlier. It was a “small variation”, the witness agreed.

They proceeded on to a point where Boy B stopped. Boy B stated that he had stopped there and went no further, Sgt Dunne said.

Mr Grehan asked the garda what he observed at that stage.

Sgt Dunne said he observed Boy A giving a glance to Boy B. “It was a look,” he said. Nothing was said and it was a very brief interaction, he added.

He said it was observed also by his colleague, Sgt Hussey. “I looked at Sgt Hussey also,” Sgt Dunne said.

He said Sgt Hussey continued on with Boy A and his father, while he, Sgt Dunne, and Boy B, walked over to a building where it was decided that a statement would be required about the route, because there was a difference between the two accounts provided.

Sgt Dunne said he went to Boy B’s house where he informed Boy B’s mother that the route had “significantly changed” from the initial route provided earlier that morning.

He said he travelled to Leixlip garda station with Boy B and his mother where a statement was taken. He said Boy B’s mother was happy to clarify.

After the statement was taken, he said he dropped Boy B and his mother home and thanked them for their assistance.

The trial continues tomorrow morning before Mr Justice Paul McDermott and a jury of eight men and four women.

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