THE dangers facing women and girls in the north are like the dark days of the most recent conflict, Health Minister Mike Nesbitt said following the killing of Karen Cummings in Banbridge.
The mother-of-two and children’s nurse died at her home in Laurel Heights following an attack on Saturday evening. Two men continued to be questioned on Monday evening by police, both, on suspicion of murder.
Friends and colleagues at Daisy Hill Hospital in Newry paid tribute to the Queen’s University graduate and former Our Lady’s Newry pupil, describing her as a “cherished daughter” and “beautiful soul”.
Mr Nesbitt said: “I am glad the Executive has a focus against ending violence against women and girls and I think we have to give true meaning to that strategy in terms of delivering on it as a legacy for Karen and the others.
Speaking in Belfast, the minister added: “I grew up in this city in what we euphemistically called ‘The Troubles’ when it was probably one of the most dangerous places in Europe, or maybe even the world, for anybody to live.
“The fact that we have now gone to a point where it is a very dangerous place for women specifically, women and girls, is shocking and it should not be tolerable and I hope the Executive will not tolerate it by delivering on that strategy by ending violence against women and girls.”
Police received a report at around 6.30pm on Saturday evening of an unconscious woman with a serious head injury inside a house.
The Northern Ireland Ambulance Service attended and provided medical treatment but Ms Cummings was pronounced dead a short time later.
A 42-year-old man was arrested at the scene. A second man in his 30s was detained on Sunday afternoon at a police cordon outside St Patrick’s cemetery on the Dromore Road in Banbridge. He had emerged from a nearby farmyard.
In a statement, the Southern health trust said the nurse was a “valued member of our staff and we have all been shocked and saddened by her untimely death”.
“Karen will be very sadly missed and remembered always especially by her paediatric nursing colleagues at Daisy Hill Hospital.”
Women’s Aid NI noted that Ms Cummings is the 25th woman killed in the north since 2020, with the vast majority murdered in their own homes. She is also the seventh woman to be murdered in 2024.
Eileen Murphy, of Women’s Aid Armagh and Down, said: “I think there is a huge opportunity as a community, as a society...to stand up and be counted..we done it for seatbelts, we done it for smoking, this is about human beings, this is about women, this is about their children, this is about real lives being tragically stolen - why can’t we stand up as a society and do it for women.”
Aghaderg GAC and Ballyvarley hurling club said they were “saddened to learn of the sudden death of Karen Cummings, mother to our U16 Camog Zara”.
“We extend our deepest sympathy to Zara and Curtis along with immediate and extended family members,” they added.
A funeral notice for Karen (née McQuaid) said she died suddenly at her home. She was the “devoted mummy of Curtis and Zara, cherished daughter of Margarita and stepdaughter of Andrew and loving granddaughter of Mary and the late Jim McQuaid”.
The family asked for privacy “as they navigate the devastating and tragic loss of Karen”.
