A heartbroken mother is pleading for justice for her son who died in England after being punched three years ago.
Katherine Barcoe, from Goresbridge, Co Kilkenny, said she has been like a zombie since Kevin Kelly, 27, was left to die on a pavement.
The 60-year-old told the Irish Mirror: “I’ll never get over this, I can’t see anyway out of this.
“The longer time passes the worse it’s getting.
“Kevin was my boy, I have to stay trying to get justice.
“I have had no peace since Kevin died.
“It destroys your life. If Kevin died of an illness you’d be prepared for it.”
The father of one became involved in a row after leaving a nightclub in Luton, near London, on May 1, 2016.
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He received a blow to the jaw that ripped an artery at the base of his neck and later died in hospital.
Richard Wood, 27, who claimed he acted in self-defence, was charged over the death. He was found not guilty of manslaughter.
But now, approaching the third anniversary of Kevin’s death, Ms Barcoe said she will not rest until she gets justice for her son.
She added: “I want the Tanaiste and Foreign Minister Simon Coveney to help get justice for Kevin.
“I want him to get in contact with the UK’s Justice Minister to reopen Kevin’s case. There is no justice for the Irish in the UK.
“There’s no justice for my son.
“If Kevin was causing trouble everywhere he went then you’d say, ‘Well, you know what he deserved it’, but he wasn’t that kind of person at all. Everybody loved Kevin.”
The distraught mother of six said her son moved to Luton after the recession where he set up his own plastering business.
She added: “The only good that ever came of this was that his organs were donated to help save others.”
