Dublin People - Sick prankster causes pain to Amy’s family

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Sick prankster causes pain to Amy’s family

Tuesday, 09 September 2008

THE family of a missing Northside girl is being targeted by a cowardly campaign of harassment from anonymous callers and internet users.
A message was recently left on the bebo.com website claiming that Amy Fitzpatrick was safe in a house in Dublin, and a phone number and address to contact her were included.
However, when the family followed up on the message, the man at the address said he had no idea where Amy was and that his internet username and password had been abused by someone else to play the sick prank.
“When we first saw the message on bebo.com we couldn’t believe it,” Amy’s aunt, Christine Kenny told Northside People.
“We were so excited at the chance to get her back.
“The message said Amy was with him and she was okay but didn't want to see anyone. You can imagine our excitement.
“When we phoned the number, this guy didn't know anything.
“He said other people had his password and he apologised. He was disgusted that someone would do something like this.
“We were absolutely gutted; it’s disturbing that someone would do this to us.

“If they knew the heartache we have gone through every day since Amy went missing they would think again.
“My heart sank with sadness. Just for one second I thought our Amy was safe; it’s a very sad thing to do, building people’s hopes up like that when we have been suffering so much.”
Christine said she has also received sinister and obscene phone calls since her number was published in national newspapers as part of an appeal to help find her missing niece.
One obscene call, the content of which Christine said she could never repeat, came during a meeting between Christine and detectives working on the case. As a result, all the incidents of harassment are now being logged.
“It started after we publicised the number in the papers asking people to call us with any information they might have,” stated Christine.
“The things they say on the phone are very shocking, just not nice things and there’s no way I could repeat them.
“We are obviously dealing with somebody who is very sick and thinks it’s funny to put a family through more suffering.”
Christine Kenny and Amy’s father, Christopher, have been running a major publicity campaign to help find the 16-year-old Coolock girl, who went missing in Spain on new year’s day.
The start of September marked eight months since Amy disappeared and Christine said she can’t believe they are still searching for her.
She has received a number of false leads in the course of her search but is unsure whether information sent was malicious or simply a mistake.
“We have had a number of people calling to say they saw her but none of the information ever leads to anything,” she said.
“A lot of girls have hair like Amy’s so it’s hard to tell if they’re wasting our time or genuinely think they saw her.
“Some of them may have thought they saw Amy but it really gets our hopes up and then dashes them.”
Christine is now urging all of Amy’s friends to think back to before she went missing and remember if she had met any new people, particularly men.
“I’d like to know if she met any new people prior to going missing,” she added.
“There have been reports in the paper that she could have gone off with a man.
“If anyone knows anything about this, or who this man could be, then please get in touch with me. Please, if you know anything then pass the information on.
“I am now trying to raise funds to hire a private investigator to work directly with the family to help find Amy.”
Meanwhile, if you would like to help Christine and Christopher in their efforts to raise funds to hire a private investigator to work on the case, the account details are as follows: Account Name: Amy Fitzpatrick Fund; Sort Code: 990641; Account Number: 13524718; Bank: Permanent TSB Raheny Village.
The account details are also available on the website www.searchforamy.com

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