THE Consistory Court of the diocese of Sodor & Man has granted a faculty for the exhumation of the body of a man who was unidentified at the time of burial, ten years ago, but who has now been identified as John Roche, of Co. Wicklow, in Ireland.
He had been born in Co. Dublin on 28 June 1972, and died somewhere between 19 December 2012 and 12 April 2013, when his body was discovered by fishermen aboard the fishing vessel The Anzac, about ten nautical miles north of Ramsey.
A year later, his body was still unidentified, and was buried in Lonan churchyard, on the Isle of Man, as an act of kindness and respect by the Manx community. After an appeal on local media, the funeral, in 2014, was attended by members of the community. The service was conducted by a local Methodist minister, and a headstone was provided by a local charity.
It had subsequently proved possible to match genetic material held in relation to the body with that of other members of the Roche family. That enabled the body to be identified as that of Mr Roche.
His partner, Stefanie Doyle, wished to have his remains returned to Co. Wicklow, where he had lived with her and their son, and for those remains to be reinterred in consecrated ground in St Gabriel’s Catholic cemetery in Arklow. All Mr Roche’s family were resident in Co. Wicklow or Co. Waterford, and they consented to that happening, as did the Lonan Burial Authority and Manx Care, the island’s public health provider.
The High Bailiff, in his capacity as the Coroner of Inquests, had opened and adjourned an inquest, and had given authority for the removal of the body from the island to permit its reinterment.
Miss Doyle’s application for a faculty for exhumation came before the Vicar-General and Diocesan Chancellor of Sodor & Man, the Worshipful Howard Connell, in the Consistory Court.
There is a presumption that burial in consecrated ground is permanent, and is to be seen as a symbol of our entrusting the person to God for resurrection. There were several decisions of the consistory courts, however, in which chancellors had given authority for exhumation as an exception from that presumption, where there was an intention to create a family grave or to reinter remains in an existing family grave.
The Chancellor said that the late Mr Roche was not buried in Lonan because of any wish of his, nor because any member of his family wished it, and “this was a clearly a case where the discretion to authorise exhumation should be exercised.” The faculty was granted authorising the exhumation of the remains of the late Mr Roche, with a view to their reburial in Co. Wicklow.