A mother is suspected of killing her seven-year-old son before committing suicide over fears that she would face a legal battle with her former partner.
The bodies of Sinead Higgins, 37, and Oisin O’Driscoll were found by the emergency services in Ruislip, west London, on Wednesday. The boy’s father, Shane O’Driscoll, a 40-year-old barrister, raised the alarm after getting no answer at the house two days earlier when he called to take his son to school.
Friends of Ms Higgins, a nurse who retrained in law to specialise in medical negligence, said she had recently gone through a difficult break-up and was facing a possible legal dispute.
Barbara Lonnan, a friend and neighbour, said Ms Higgins was depressed after the split and worried about not being able to pay her rent. “When she first came here two years ago, she was really bubbly, but she got more and more depressed,” she said. “I know she was depressed but to take him as well . . . her family must be devastated.”
Ms Lonnan had told her friend to seek psychiatric help but Ms Higgins said she had the situation “in hand”.
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She worked at St George’s Hospital, Tooting, from 2004 and 2011 and had done shifts treating footballers at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital but the work tailed off as she became ill.
Ms Higgins, from Ireland, had voiced her feelings on social media, posting: “I am no longer afraid of monsters, because I once loved one.” She also quoted from Jonathan Anthony Burkett’s book Neglected But Undefeated: “You know my name, not my story. You’ve heard what I’ve done, not what I’ve been through. If you were in my shoes, you’d fall at the first step.”
Her last message read: “The future looks very” followed by a picture of a tornado. One friend said Ms Higgins was deeply unhappy and worried about her future with Oisin.
The parents of his primary school friends left flowers outside the house where Spider-Man curtains hung at his bedroom window. He was described as a “happy little boy”.
Mr O’Driscoll, who works for Aspen Technology, a software company, was surrounded by his family from Ireland at his home two miles away.
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Detective Inspector Dave Bolton, of the Metropolitan Police homicide and major crime unit, said: “Inquiries so far lead us to believe that the tragic events do not involve a third party. We are appealing to anyone who has any information to come and speak with us.”
It was understood that although the incident is being investigated as a murder and suicide, detectives are treating the deaths as unexplained pending a post-mortem examination that is due to take place today.
Ms Higgins’s family suffered tragedy in 2004 when her brother Cathal died at 19 in a motorbike accident. Her father Tom Higgins was active in Irish politics and was visited on his deathbed in 2014 by the prime minister Enda Kenny.