"We thought it would be a safe r place for them in their teenage years, " Nora told the Sunday Tribune this weekend. "We had five beautiful children, and we were all jumping for joy to be going home. We never wanted to go to England in the first place."

For 11 years, the family realised their dream. Bill Lynch grew organic vegetables and sold them to hotels. The children integrated seamlessly into their new schools and new lives.

Things were good.

"Honest ly, we were like a bunch of kids, we were so happy, " said Nora.

"The seven of us were always there for each other. We sat around the table at dinner, and we could be there for three hours, just chatting to each other. We loved being around each other. And it was all ruined, in five seconds of savage violence. A totally vicious act that took no thought, and our family was destroyed."

Those five fatal seconds involved Christopher Cooney putting a knife to Robert Lynch's neck in a pub in Ennis, and slashing open his throat.

Robert had seen Cooney fighting with his wife. He had intervened. He had been killed for his trouble. And so began a spiral of tragic events that was to rip apart the entire Lynch fam ily.

It started with Billy, Robert's older brother. He was going to a party in Limerick on the night Robert was killed, and had dropped him off in Ennis along the way. "He blamed himself, " said Nora. "He couldn't stop thinking that if he had just driven Rob the whole way, he wouldn't be dead now. It ate away at him, until it just drove him away."

In the years after Robert's death, Billy got married, set up his own landscaping business, employed eight people, and generally seemed to be getting on with his life. But nine years ago, the façade fell apart.

Billy split from his wife, and isolated himself from his family. "He's living as a recluse now in some part of Ennis, and he doesn't want anything to do with us, " said Nora. "We see him maybe once a year. He just couldn't get past Rob's death."

The youngest member of the family, Emma, also struggled to deal with her brother's murder. She was 14 years old when Robert died and, according to Nora, she simply couldn't cope. "She couldn't take it in, she couldn't understand how someone could kill a person as loving and peaceful as Rob, " said Nora. "She had to have counselling, and then when she was 16, she got pregnant with her first child."

In 2004, Emma committed suicide, leaving behind two young children to be cared for by Nora and Bill.

"She went to join Rob. She just couldn't take it any more, " said Nora. "She was my baby, and she was 28 when she died."

The remaining Lynch family members continue to grieve. They still talk a lot to each other, but now it's often a conversation about Rob and that fatal night. They cry a lot now too. "Our family has been destroyed, " said Nora. "It's just so difficult to keep coming back from the things that have happened. That is why we are so angry with what has happened with Mr Killeen. That is why we are allowing people to see the horrible private parts of our lives. Because this can't happen to another family. At least, we can try to save people from that."