A prior heroin conviction, a return to Ireland—and two lives taken: the Aurimas Andruska double murder

Lithuanian national Aurimas Andruska returned to Ireland in February 2013 after an earlier Lithuanian conviction for heroin storage and acquisition. Four months later, Jolanta Lubiene and her eight-year-old daughter Enrika were stabbed 72 times between them. A unanimous jury convicted him of both murders; the Court of Appeal later said abundant evidence supported the trial findings and rejected every ground of appeal.

Published 26 July 2026 · Remigration Ireland case ledger

Two murdersMother and eight-year-old daughter

72 wounds61 and 11, inquest evidence

Two life sentencesConcurrent, not consecutive

Appeal failedAll grounds dismissed

The prosecution case against Andruska was circumstantial. That must be stated plainly. So must the outcome: twelve jurors returned unanimous guilty verdicts, and a three-judge Court of Appeal later ruled that abundant evidence supported the trial findings. This is not an unresolved accusation. It is a final double-murder conviction.

A prior conviction, movement between countries and a return to Kerry

Andruska first moved to Ireland in 2007. At one point he lived with others at 9 Langford Downes in Killorglin, the house where the murders would later be committed. He returned to Lithuania, worked building tombstones and came back to Ireland in February 2013.

At sentencing, the Central Criminal Court heard that Andruska had a previous Lithuanian conviction relating to heroin storage and acquisition. The Irish Times also reported that he was a heroin user when he returned. The published evidence does not establish that drugs motivated the murders, and this page does not claim that they did. The material fact is narrower: a man with a reported foreign drug conviction returned to Ireland and, four months later, committed two murders.

A mother and child killed in their home

Between 15 and 17 June 2013, 27-year-old care-home worker Jolanta Lubiene and her eight-year-old daughter Enrika were murdered at their rented Killorglin home. The later inquest heard that Jolanta suffered 61 stab wounds and Enrika suffered 11. Fragments of the same bladed weapon were found near their bodies.

No motive was established at trial, and no intact murder weapon was produced. Those are limits in the record, not reasons to rewrite the verdict. Andruska denied killing them throughout the investigation and trial. The jury rejected his denial.

The evidence that put Andruska in the blood-soaked house

Gardaí initially sought elimination fingerprints and saliva samples from people in the area. On 19 June 2013, two gardaí met Andruska and other Lithuanian residents in Killorglin and obtained samples. After his arrest on 27 June, further fingerprints and DNA were taken in detention.

The circumstantial strands presented to the jury included:

A bloody mark on the stairwell wall contained Jolanta's DNA and ridge detail matching Andruska's fingerprints.
DNA recovered from Enrika's top matched Andruska.
Footwear impressions ran through blood in the house. The prosecution linked their distinctive type to shoes Andruska was shown wearing on CCTV; the shoes themselves were never recovered.
Andruska said he had thrown away his shoes because they were old, not because they were bloodstained.

He was charged at a special sitting of Killarney District Court on 28 June 2013 and remanded in custody. When the charges were put to him, he denied the killings.

Unanimous verdicts and two concurrent life sentences

The Central Criminal Court trial in Tralee lasted five weeks. On 6 November 2014, after deliberating for about two hours and forty-five minutes, a jury of seven women and five men unanimously convicted Andruska of both murders.

Mr Justice Patrick McCarthy imposed the mandatory sentence of life imprisonment on each count. The two life sentences run concurrently. They are not cumulative fixed terms, and the court did not set a minimum tariff that can defensibly be invented for a headline.

The Court of Appeal rejected every ground

Andruska challenged the circumstances in which his original fingerprints and DNA had been obtained, arguing that he had not properly understood that providing them was voluntary or potentially significant. He also challenged aspects of the fingerprint expert's evidence.

On 30 January 2017, the Court of Appeal dismissed all grounds in DPP v Andruska [2017] IECA 32. Mr Justice George Birmingham, sitting with Mr Justice Alan Mahon and Mr Justice John Edwards, said the appeal court could not overturn the trial judge's supported findings that Andruska understood he had a choice. The expert-evidence complaint was found to have no substance. The court described the supporting evidence as abundant and upheld both convictions.

Case chronology

2007: Andruska first moves from Lithuania to Ireland and later lives for a time at 9 Langford Downes.
Before February 2013: He returns to Lithuania. A later sentencing report records a Lithuanian conviction for heroin storage and acquisition.
February 2013: Andruska returns to Ireland.
15–17 June 2013: Jolanta Lubiene and Enrika are murdered in their Killorglin home.
19 June 2013: Gardaí obtain elimination fingerprints and a DNA sample.
27–28 June 2013: Andruska is arrested, charged with both killings and remanded in custody.
6 November 2014: A unanimous jury convicts him of both murders; two concurrent mandatory life sentences are imposed.
30 January 2017: The Court of Appeal dismisses every conviction ground.
24 April 2017: An inquest report identifies him as serving the concurrent life sentences—the latest explicit custody confirmation located for this page.

A conservative prison-cost benchmark

The Irish Prison Service reported that an available staffed prison space cost an average of €99,072 a year in 2024, excluding capital expenditure. Applied retrospectively as a flat benchmark from sentencing on 6 November 2014 to the latest located explicit custody report on 24 April 2017, 900 days equals about 2.464 years, or approximately €244,120.

That is deliberately a lower, source-bounded illustration—not an audited bill for Andruska. It excludes his pre-sentence remand and any imprisonment after April 2017 because this page has not located a newer source confirming his custody and location. It also excludes Garda investigation, prosecution, courts, free legal aid, the appeal, healthcare and the costs borne by the victims' family. The calculation uses a later system-wide average and must not be presented as an exact historic personal cost.

What the record establishes

The record establishes that a Lithuanian national with a reported Lithuanian heroin conviction returned to Ireland, murdered a mother and her young child, received two concurrent life sentences and failed to overturn either conviction. It does not establish that Andruska was an asylum seeker, unlawfully present, subject to a deportation order or previously considered for removal. Those claims should not be attached to this case without evidence.