A jury is to be sworn in this afternoon at the inquest of Noah Donohoe, the Belfast schoolboy who was found dead in a storm drain in June 2020.
The Jury Selection process will get underway at 12pm at Laganside Court in Belfast.
The inquest has been long-awaited, having been scheduled to take place in November 2025, but being delayed due to concerns that hearing evidence would not be finished before Christmas.
Noah Donohoe, a pupil at St Malachy’s College in Belfast, lived in the Holylands area of South Belfast close to Queen’s University. He was found dead six days after he went missing. The Noah Donohoe Foundation was set up by his mother Fiona in his memory, offering grants to support children and young people across Northern Ireland.
Ms Donohoe has campaigned for answers since her son died almost six years ago, and hopes that the inquest process will provide answers to some of her questions regarding the death of her teenage son.
The delayed inquest has generated a significant amount of public interest in the North over the unexplained nature of the 14-year-old’s death. Earlier this month, a judge issued a warning about potentially serious consequences over any speculative social media posts in advance of the inquest.
The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) has faced questions over its handling of the case. Fiona Donohoe questioned its decision to release CCTV footage of Noah, from the night before he went missing, in October 2025, five and a half years after his disappearance.
The footage shows Noah leaving his home on Fitzroy Avenue at around 3:34am on Sunday, June 21 2020, before returning just over half an hour later at 4:08am. In the footage, the schoolboy is seen leaving wearing flip-flops and headphones, which are not in the footage when he returns home on what was a wet night.
The next day, June 21, Noah left his home again at 5.40pm, cycling through Belfast city centre. The last known sighting of him alive was at 6.08pm when he was captured on CCTV from Northwood Drive in Belfast.
In 2023, over £150,000 was raised by the public in a crowdfunder for an independent investigation into Noah’s death.
The campaign was led by Dublin-based journalist Donal MacIntyre, who had been asked by Fiona Donohoe to conduct the probe. Mr MacIntyre put together a team which included a former Detective Chief Inspector Clive Driscoll, who solved the Stephen Lawrence murder case in Britain.
Also involved in the independent investigation was prominent Scotland Yard Detective Andy Crocker, and Professor Emeritus of Criminology David Wilson, who carried out new forensic testing and re-examinations of the evidence.
Mr MacIntyre, who has raised concerns about PSNI transparency, will assist the inquest into Noah’s death, providing materials from the investigation. Back in June, a barrister told a pre-inquest hearing that the investigative journalist had been “very helpful” and had voluntarily provided material to the inquest.