Drennan family release victim impact statement as they campaign for justice for Joe

THE FAMILY of the late Joe Drennan who lost his life in a hit-and-run incident have released their full victim impact statement this Sunday as they fight for "justice for Joe".

The statement was read out by Joe’s sister Sarah at Kieran Fogarty’s sentencing hearing before Christmas.

The family have given the Limerick Leader / Limerick Live the statement in full as they continue to campaign for the sentence to be appealed by the DPP.

Fogarty, aged 21, from Hyde Avenue, Ballinacurra Weston, received a six-and-half-year sentence on Thursday for dangerous driving causing the death of Mr Drennan, aged 21, on October 13, 2023.

Judge Colin Daly said it would run concurrent to an eight-year sentence imposed on Fogarty for shooting up a house as part of gangland feud.

There was confusion in the packed courtroom as Judge Daly first said the eight-year jail sentence was to be served consecutively to the six-and-a-half-year prison term for dangerous driving causing the death of Mr Drennan. Judge Daly then said it was to be served concurrently after prosecuting barrister John O'Sullivan sought clarification.

Members of the Drennan family from Knocknagad, Camross, Mountrath, Co Laois said after the sentencing hearing they were “disgusted”.

They said Fogarty “would not serve anything” for Joe’s death and it was an “insult”.

They say Joe was never in trouble a day in his life but now after his death he has been mixed up in serious criminality through the sentence imposed. 

The Drennan family say a 100-year sentence won’t bring their beloved Joe back but they would have “accepted” the six-and-half-year jail sentence for killing Joe if it was consecutive to the eight-year sentence for the firearms offence.

They have released the victim impact statement in full as part of their campaign calling on the DPP to make the “right and early decision” regarding appealing the sentence.

The last line reads: “Nothing can change what happened, but I hope that whatever justice can be served today will honor his memory.” 

The State has 28 days to appeal the court’s judgment.

The DPP can ask the Court of Criminal Appeal to review a sentence which she thinks is "unduly lenient’ which happened in the case of Cathal Crotty who assaulted Natasha O'Brien.

Drennan family's victim impact statement 

There are no words that can fully capture the depth of my grief since the day my brother was taken from us. But today, I am here to speak about the impact that my brother's death has had on my life. I struggle to find the words to truly convey the devastation it has brought into my life. My brother was taken in an act of recklessness that goes beyond mere negligence. It was not an accident—it was a choice.

He wasn’t just my brother; he was my best friend, my confidant, and the one person in the world who truly understood me. We shared everything—memories, laughter, our childhood and so many future plans. He was not just another statistic; he was my brother. He had a name—Joe Drennan —and a life full of promise.

His loss has left an unbearable emptiness that I cannot escape from. I hear echoes of his laughter in moments of silence, but when I reach for him, there is nothing. Joe was taken from us in the most violent, senseless way possible, in a moment that should never have happened—a moment of reckless disregard for human life.

One of a kind

Joe was truly one of a kind. He was my rock—someone I could always count on, no matter what. He had this incredible way of bringing light and laughter to any room with his smile and sense of humor.

Joe was born on the 29th of September 2002. He was so outgoing and knew exactly what he wanted in life, to use his potential to make the world a better place. Joe was exceptionally smart and excelled at school, he was always so kind to everybody and made so many friends from all walks of life. In secondary school he was a part of the student council and German debating team, he always wanted to make things better. Joe went on to study Journalism and German in University of Limerick. 

READ MORE: OPINION: For a long time, I wish I died with Joe but he taught me one of life's great lessons

He had just been nominated for Editor in Chief of the Limerick Voice Newspaper a few weeks before he was killed. He rang me weeks before to talk about his pitch for editor, explaining how he wanted to make the newspaper wildly inclusive. Explaining how he wanted people to research communities, minority groups and people that don’t usually have a voice to be featured in the newspaper.

Joe had a keen sense of justice and strived for excellence. Joe worked for GCN Gay Community News, he wrote many articles and was a regular contributor to the magazine. Joe was nominated for nationwide awards in the National Student Media Awards for short story of the year in 2022 and Journalist of the year in 2023. 

Heart of gold

Beyond all of Joe's many accomplishments he had a heart of gold; he was always patient and understanding, the first person to offer support. Myself and Joe would ring each other everyday, some days multiple times because that’s just how close we were. We spoke to each other every single day.

Today it will be 427 days since I last spoke to my brother, what I would give for just one more phone call hearing him say “love ya” like he always did.

That night on October 13th I was waiting for Joe to finish up in work to call him, but we didn’t get that chance ever again. 

Joe was wise beyond his years and gave the best advice, guiding me and everyone around him to be their best self. You wouldn’t think he had just turned 21. His courage and determination inspired me and everyone else every day, and I am so lucky to have had him, not just as a brother but as my best friend.

He had a huge smile that was infectious and a head full of curls. He gave the best hugs, and to know we will never get to see his smile, hear his laugh or be graced with one of his loving hugs, will forever haunt us. We should have had him years, decades longer, I simply can not imagine life without him. How I am supposed to live years without my best friend by my side. 

Since Joe's death there has been writing competitions collaborated with media like the Irish times, Laois Pride, SMEDIAS, GCN, all in his honour, this is a testament to the person he was.

Joe was meant to be a star. He would always say he was going to be rich and famous because that’s just how confident and sure of himself he was, and he was right to be. He was so incredibly talented. Unfortunately, he was made famous for all the wrong reasons. 

Pain and suffering

Every day, I am haunted by the thought of how his last moments must have felt. He must have been terrified and in excruciating pain being pinned under a car.  These thoughts keep me awake at night. The crash took not only Joe's beautiful life but shattered the lives of everyone who loved him. Our family will never be whole again. We will forever be a broken, incomplete version of what we once were.

I have watched my parents wither under the weight of their grief, turning inward as though the light inside them has gone out. They were supposed to grow old surrounded by their children, not burying one of them. 

The confusion and unbearable pain that night on October 13th when I rang to tell them our Joe had been killed. When the guards came to our door, I was alone in the house and I thought this just has to be a mistake. Even when the guards told me Joe had been killed in a road collision I thought to myself, when I get to the hospital he will be fine. This is all a horrible nightmare and he will be waiting for me with his big smile. Can you imagine that hour drive, alone in the back of the garda car, or having to ring my family members one by one to tell them that our Joe had been killed. 

READ MORE: 'Disgusting': Joe Drennan's sister reacts to sentence handed down to Limerick criminal in fatal collision

I still remember the screams and cries of my family members, my mother and fathers is something I will never forget when I rang to tell them that they had to come home from their holiday because Joe had been killed. My parents never got to say goodbye to their beautiful little boy, nobody did.

Broken

I remember going to see Joe that night after he had been killed, bloody, bruised and broken. His head of curls still there, it felt like I was just waiting for him to wake up - or for me to wake up from this nightmare. But we both didn’t wake up. Now, holidays, birthdays, life in general are cruel reminders of his absence, filled with an aching quiet that hangs over us. Every day is marked by the emptiness of the chair where he should be sitting.

As for me, I feel like I have lost a piece of my own identity. There is a hole inside me that will never heal. I was his sister; that was a part of who I was. Now, it feels like I am just drifting, lost in a world where he no longer exists.

My life is a blur of trying to move forward while carrying a grief so heavy, it often feels like I can’t breathe. I try to remember what it felt like to be happy, but even my memories are tainted now. I cannot enjoy life in the same way. Every day since our Joe was killed, I have shed so many tears, just wishing I could at least call him. I wake up everyday thinking this has to be a nightmare but I am always reminded that this is our life now. 

We have to live with the fact that he will never get to do the things we used to dream about together. We will never get to move to Berlin together as we had planned, he’ll never get to  have a family, or be the fashionable old man he was meant to be. All of his future was stolen in an instant of reckless decision-making.

I think about the life that he was supposed to have, the milestones he will never reach. I will never get to have him be my best man at my wedding or tell him I have named my future child after him like I always planned because that is just how much he meant to me. He was our everything. There is no closure, no moving on from this. There is only learning to live with a pain that doesn’t fade, a loss that doesn’t heal.

Unbearable injustice

And to know that it was caused by someone’s deliberate choice to drive dangerously is an unbearable injustice. It is not an accident when it could have been prevented, when it was caused by a disregard for the safety of others.

Kieran Fogarty knew that my brother was lying there, broken and in need of help, and instead of calling for assistance, he chose to run away. He didn’t stay to check if Joe was alive, or even to acknowledge his suffering.

I am haunted every day by the thought of him dying alone, scared, and in pain.

There was no one to hold his hand, no one to tell him that help was on the way. He did not deserve to die like that—abandoned and discarded as if his life meant nothing.

My brother did not have to die. Joe was taken from us because someone made the decision to value speed and thrill over a human life.

Funeral

Joe's funeral was huge, with all walks of life attending, people from all over Ireland and Europe made it to our small village in Camross to attend.

Joe touched the hearts of so many people, we heard so many stories about how Joe made such an impression in his short life. At Joe's wake people noticed how Joe didn’t have his head of curls while he lay in the coffin, we couldn’t have Joe's beautiful curls as the damage to his head was too severe. 

What stood out to us was people kept repeating the same thing “It’s just tragic, Joe was just in the wrong place at the wrong time”. But Joe wasn’t in the wrong place at the wrong time, he was in the right place. Finishing a day of work, earning his money for college, waiting for a bus to bring him home. Waiting for a bus to bring him home. Kieran Fogarty was in the wrong place, he should have never been in the car in the first place. He shouldn’t have even been out on the streets. 

READ MORE: 'Joe died like a dog on streets of Limerick and that lad left him there' - Joe Drennan's father

Animal

On the night of October 13th was when our life sentence began. Joe received a death sentence that night. Kieran Fogarty was judge, jury and executioner. He killed our Joe. He left our Joe to die on the street pinned under his car alone. He wiped down the car and ran away like the coward he is.

He chose to drive the way he did, running from the guards, driving without insurance or a license, he was out on bail when he killed Joe, he should have been locked up like the animal he is. He imposed the death penalty on Joe, he imposed a life sentence on everyone that loved Joe. It is a life sentence until our dying breath. 

I am not asking for mercy; I am asking for justice.

Justice for my brother, who deserved better.

Justice for a life cut short, a future stolen, and a family broken.

I hope that you will see the choices that were made that night for what they are: a cold disregard for human life and a complete failure to show the most basic human decency. There must be accountability for the life that was lost and the lives that have been ruined because of it.

Joe was tragically unlucky that night, but Limerick was fortunate that more lives weren’t lost in such a senseless and preventable tragedy.

College should be a safe space and parents should feel assured sending their children to college. It is a place to learn, grow, and build a future—not a place where young lives are cut short on the side of a road. 

Justice

Joe was a kind and compassionate person who never engaged in any form of criminality. His greatest ambition was to help others and to be a voice for the voiceless. Kieran Fogarty cruelly silenced Joe’s voice, and in his death, we want Joe’s legacy to remain untainted by any association with Fogarty’s criminal activities. Our only focus is Justice for Joe—justice that reflects his life and the loss we have suffered, not diluted by Fogarty’s unrelated crimes

My brother’s name was Joe Drennan. He was loved. He was important. And now, he is gone forever. Forever 21 years old.

Joe will never be forgotten and our love for him will never fade, he was the heart of our family. And no matter how many tomorrows are left for me, I will miss him in every single one. Nothing can change what happened, but I hope that whatever justice can be served today will honor his memory.