“Time goes on for everybody else and life moves on, but I’m stuck back in that time. When you lose a child, you lose everything”
NI mum fighting for answers after son’s death
The mum of a teenage boy who was found dead in a ditch in Co Tyrone after a night out is still fighting for answers three years on.
Matthew McCallan was a “kind, caring, and witty” fifteen-year-old who had been heading to a jamboree in Fintona, near Omagh, with a group of friends in December 2022. His mum, Frances, said the young man had just started to come out of his shell and was looking forward to enjoying a night out.
However, he never made it home on that freezing cold night. After losing his phone, it’s understood he got on a bus home with friends that had been organised in advance, but left the bus at some point. After a two-day search involving the local community, PSNI, and the Community Rescue Service, Matthew’s body was found in a ditch just two miles from the country music festival he had attended.
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In a recent video shared on social media, Frances said if a voluntary search dog group had been tasked to the area the day after her son went missing, he may still be here today.
Speaking to Belfast Live at her home outside Dungannon this week, Frances said: “It was a Saturday night and the jamboree had been planned for, he was looking forward to it. Matthew and his best friend, his cousin Thomas, were getting ready in our house, they had new clothes that had to be ironed of course, and the brown boots had to be cleaned and scrubbed up.
“They had their food and the craic was mighty in the kitchen, I was in the living room putting up the Christmas tree and Matthew’s friend Molly pulled up in her car, and away the boys went. Molly and good go hand-in-hand, so I had no doubt he would be absolutely fine, she was driving, but joined them all on the bus for the craic.
“He sent me a selfie at around 7.30pm of him and the girls, and confirmed he would be coming home that night. Never in his life did he send me a selfie, that was the first time.”
Looking back on that night, the devastated mum recalls the moment she realised something went wrong. She said: “Molly and Thomas rang me at 1.15am. People are highly critical that they didn’t get off the bus, but they weren’t allowed to get off the bus.
“In doing so, they thought the right decision would be to go back down the road and look for Matthew after picking up Molly’s car from the bus drop-off point.
“They got off the bus, into the car, and back down to Fintona. Me and Matthew’s daddy were already on our way to Fintona just thinking it was a matter of going up and coming back down. We went back home as we thought he would’ve let himself in to the cabin at the back of the house, that he’d be in there toasty and warm.
“But he wasn’t there, so I called police and my niece, Nicole. We went back out to drive down to Fintona and Omagh, we looked everywhere. I remember shouting his name out the windows, and I had a really sick feeling.
“There are other members of the family who if they didn’t come home, you would’ve thought they probably went to a party. But everybody knew Matthew wasn’t like that.”
After calling the police, Frances said officers searched her house and her sister’s house as protocol. The family and wider community then came out in their droves to search for Matthew hours after he went missing.
However, despite the Community Rescue Service being tasked to the search, Frances cannot understand why the PSNI did not also task Search and Rescue Dog Association – Ireland North to help.
She said: “At 9am on the Sunday, the dog rescue group put out they were available to search for Matthew, they obviously felt they could help. They said they had six scent dogs and police were aware they were on standby. But the police did not task them.
“What I want to know is why weren’t they tasked? Who felt they were better educated that they could call that shot? The police haven’t answered one question.
“The Community Rescue Service were tasked but we were outside the Ecclesville Centre in Omagh at around 5pm, the crowds were gathered and being briefed, and my brother said to me ‘Frances, it’s getting dark.’ The light was against us.
“At that stage, I thought he would have been knocked down and was lying in a hedge. On the Sunday morning, everybody was shouting into the hedges – I just never thought he would be found dead in a ditch. I just never dreamt that would happen.”
A spokesperson for SARDA-IN said: “As all Voluntary NISAR assets are, SARDA IN dog teams are always available for searches 24/7 at the request of tasking authorities and in support of our NISAR colleagues. It is not uncommon for search dogs not to be deployed immediately in missing person searches.”
On the Monday morning, two days after he went missing, Matthew’s body was found. A post-mortem examination found his cause of death was hypothermia.
Looking back on the moment she was told the tragic news, Frances said: “I was in a community hall, crowds were gathering to search and people were making sandwiches and tea.
“Two police liaison officers arrived and brought me into a side room, they were asking questions and I was answering them as best I could. I remember an officer said ‘there’s been an update, a body has been found.’ But then she said, ‘but it might not be Matthew.’
“So because of that I remember thinking to myself it wasn’t him. But then I thought there’s hardly loads of bodies lying around Fintona. I just think it was brutal for them to tell me that information without my family there, I love my friends but it wasn’t their place to be there, and they have since said that to me.
“Then Matthew’s daddy arrived in and he had been on site when they found Matthew, so they allowed him to identify his body. Those words ‘there’s been a body found, but it might not be him’ still absolutely haunt me, it was just said so casually.”
As for what her young son was like, Frances said he was “kind, caring, and witty.” He was just beginning to go out with his friends, and starting to come out of his shell and put himself out there.
She said, smiling: “As he was getting older, he had become witty, he had a really dry sense of humour. A girl contacted me to tell me her brother had died in a farming accident, and Matthew would make her send him a photograph of her empty plate to make sure she ate her food.
“Another wee fella contacted me and said he wouldn’t be here without him. Him and his girlfriend had broken up, and only for Matthew being there for him, he doesn’t know if he would still be here. That’s the type of person he was.
“I would say to him ‘I gave you £20 yesterday where did it go?’ and he would say ‘mummy such and such had no money, so I got them chips as well.’ To me, that’s a lovely quality, he was so kind, caring, he was good craic and he loved the craic as well.”
Frances and her family raised concerns about the initial police response to the search for Matthew, with the PSNI referring itself to the Police Ombudsman.
In 2024, Frances’ request for legal aid to be represented at her son’s inquest was denied. The inquest will be held to help establish the circumstances surrounding Matthew’s death.
The Legal Services Agency said it was “not in the wider public interest” as based on the evidence currently available, it did not indicate a “systemic failure on the part of the PSNI.”
However, as they did not task SARDA-IN to the searches, Frances believes the PSNI have demonstrated systemic failures in her son’s case.
When approached for a statement, a spokesperson for the Legal Services Agency said: “The Agency does not comment on individual cases. However, any individual can make an application for legal aid or renew an application if their application was refused and there has been a change in circumstances. The Agency considers all applications on their merits on a case-by-case basis.”
As for how she is coping day-to-day, Frances said her friends and family have been a big help. Over the past few years, she has also formed close friendships with Noah Donohoe’s mum, Fiona, and Lisa Dorrian’s sister, Joanne.
She said their support is helping her gain back “a bit of fight” ahead of an inquest. Frances said: “Fiona Donohoe and I talk a lot, we get a lot from each other, as Noah was her only child, and Matthew was my only child. We totally get each other.
“The conversations don’t be tiny, but we’re there to support each other. That night when I came home, Fiona was the person I reached out to, I messaged her and she answered the phone to me, so that’s how our friendship began.
“We haven’t had a preliminary hearing for the inquest in over a year. The police haven’t answered one question to date.
“You feel so alone, it feels like there is nobody there to support me. I have been helped by the lovely Joanne Dorrian, Lisa’s sister, who was with me last week and gave me a list of things I can go ahead and do myself ahead of an inquest.
“She has given me that wee bit of a fight which I lost, to be honest. There’s a group of us who have suffered injustice, and what we want is answers, and we don’t want this to happen again to anybody.
“Time goes on for everybody else and life moves on, but I’m stuck back in that time. When you lose a child, you lose everything. I lost everything, even caring for that child, cooking for that child, doing washing and ironing, school runs – I lost my whole identity, and it’s very hard to rebuild that.
“I have a lot of people in my life that love me, my nieces and nephews because Matthew was an only child. He was in hospital shortly before all this happened and the doctor asked did he have any brothers or sisters and he said ‘no, but I have cousins.’ They were all so close.”
A PSNI spokesperson said: “Our thoughts remain with Matthew’s devastated family however as there is an ongoing inquest, it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time.”
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