Murdered Mom’s Family Say They Saw No Red Flags With Asylum Seeker Before Death of His Anti-ICE Activist Girlfriend

Murdered New York mother Jamey Carney had “a heart of gold,” “wanted equal rights for everyone” and was “an insanely caring human being,” according to family members, who say they never suspected her boyfriend, an asylum seeker who fled the country in the hours after her death, prompting an international manhunt.Speaking on the Irish broadcast RTE News on Thursday night, Ms. Carney’s cousin Ryan Fox urged the public not to make his cousin “a martyr,” but said if he had any inkling of her fate, “measures would have been taken.”Following the discovery of Ms. Carney’s body, bloodied and beaten at the home she shared with her teenage daughter in Killarney, Co. Kerry, Ireland, on Tuesday, Ahmad Alsaqer, whom she reportedly met at a pro-Palestine demonstration last year, immediately emerged as the prime suspect in her death.Mr. Alsaqer, a national of Jordan who has resided in state-provided migrant housing in Ireland since 2024, took a 3 am bus from Killarney, Co. Kerry, to Dublin before flying to Turkey in the early hours Tuesday morning, according to Irish media reports.“An Garda Síochána is satisfied that a person of interest in this investigation left the jurisdiction in the early hours of Tuesday 7th July prior to the body of the deceased female being discovered and reported to An Garda Síochána,” the Irish national police force stated.“As part of this ongoing investigation An Garda Síochána is engaging with international Law Enforcement partners,” the statement continued.As of Friday morning, Interpol has not issued a red notice, or call to international police agencies to arrest Alsaqer. Under Irish law, the police may only seek extradition after a suspect has been charged.“Gardaí continue to appeal to any person who was in the Muckross Road area of Killarney between 11 pm on the 6th of July and 5am on the 7th of July 2026 and who may have camera footage, including CCTV or dashcam, is asked to provide this footage to investigating Gardaí,” the police said.A post mortem found Ms. Carney’s cause of death was suffocation, The Irish Times reported Thursday. Earlier reports noted that the single mom also suffered severe head trauma. She was found by her 13-year-old daughter in her bed, covered by a duvet, in the early afternoon Tuesday. By that time Mr. Alsaqer was already clear of Ireland and the European Union, according to the police timeline.Mr. Alsaqer was a fixture on Ms. Carney’s social media accounts, where her bio called to “Free Palestine” and “Fk” next to a picture of an ice cube. In her final Instagram post on July 4, the pair posed together wearing New York sports team T-shirts in front of an image of Times Square. “Happy 4th y’all” she wrote, followed by an image of the Statue of Liberty and a laughing face.An image posted on July 2 shows Mr. Alsaqer smiling between Ms. Carney and her daughter.In the weeks before her death, Ms. Carney posted videos of herself and Mr. Alsaqer embracing, practicing Arabic and attending a Cure concert in Dublin. The pair also attended a pro-Palestine demonstration last year. Another post shows Ms. Carney wearing a checkered keffiyeh.The case has elicited outcries referencing growing frustration in some quarters over immigration to Ireland, which has seen a surge in asylum claims since 2022. Pervasive infrastructure strains, including national housing and health care shortages, and government programs that have deposited successive waves of refugees in rural areas with little plan for integrating them have increased debates over how many asylum seekers the Republic of Ireland should accept.Mixed martial artist Conor McGregor, whose call to limit immigration was foundational to his short-lived presidential campaign last year called the situation “the saddest story in the West,” during a press conference at Las Vegas on Friday. “It’s a travesty that our borders are wide open and the most violent cultures are hoisted upon our people in our rural towns and the crime that is taking place is showing it,” he continued. “If God wills it, I’ll do it and I’ll step in.”In 2025 the government of Ireland denied 79 percent of the 19,558 asylum claims it decided.Matt Carthy, a spokesperson for the Sinn Fein political party called for the national police to clarify their reluctance to directly identify Mr. Alsaqer as the person of interest in Ms. Carney’s murder in remarks to the Irish Independent.“Ensuring public safety and apprehending dangerous criminals must be the overriding priority for An Garda Síochána in serious cases,” Mr. Carthy said, noting that he had submitted questions to the Justice Minister regarding the case.On the other side of the political spectrum, Socialist lawmaker Ruth Coppinger accused media of “stoking the flames of racism” by reporting that the person of interest in Ms. Carney’s murder is an asylum seeker.Ms. Carney’s sister, Devon Bennett, called her sister “an insanely caring human being, who dedicated so much of herself, her energy, and her time, to fighting for the rights of others” in a GoFundMe appeal that she shared on Instagram.Ms. Bennett said she and their mother traveled to Ireland, where the pair are “working with the Killarney Garda and social services to make sure my niece can stay in the land she loves, especially while grieving this tragic loss.” In her last post before her sister’s death, Ms. Bennett posted an image of graffiti that reads “Stop Femicide.”

Murdered Mom’s Family Say They Saw No Red Flags With Asylum Seeker Before Death of His Anti-ICE Activist Girlfriend

Murdered Mom’s Family Say They Saw No Red Flags With Asylum Seeker Before Death of His Anti-ICE Activist Girlfriend

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