gary Dineen knew how to build a tune around a sample, a note, a chord. He definitely had a way with words.

On his Soundcloud account, Gary De Don,  his songs are still spinning in the eternity of the internet, and the lyrics roll in his distinctive Cork city accent, rapping about things being "scripted in scriptures" and how "things are falling apart, gotta move on, gotta stay strong... rise to the top".

Gary, originally from St Luke's Cross in the city, might have reached the summit, but it wasn't to be. On August 12 last his body was found near the entrance to the Merchant's Quay shopping centre. In the days that followed gardai ruled out foul play, with CCTV footage indicating Gary had entered the carpark alone on August 8. An inquest may piece together what happened, but one working theory is that he fell to his death. He was just 35.

As his family mourned his tragic passing, attention turned to a radio interview he had given to Cork’s 96FM just weeks previously. Speaking as 'James' he said the pandemic had made a bad situation worse, not least because of a reduction in the capacity of the Nightlight emergency service provided by Cork Simon and Cork City Council.

“I’m lucky to get in on a mattress on the floor at night and they threw me out at 7 o’clock in the morning, until 11 at night, during the whole virus, they’re kicking me out at 7 o’clock in the morning, not leaving me in until 11pm and then 11pm becomes 11.30pm," he said.

As he had rapped a few years before: "live well, escape from the depths of hell..."

Kathryn Connolly misses her brother. "I still do, it's very, very hard."

Gary, four years younger than Kathryn, "was the baby" in the family. Their older brother, Don, passed away 10 years ago. Gary's Soundcloud name was a tribute to his memory.

Kathryn, who lives in Tralee, went above and beyond on Gary's behalf over the years, but there is little solace in that now. As she points out, Gary didn't come from poverty, but he had his own struggles. There was teenage experimentation with drugs, but she believes it was her brother's mental health issues which derailed him at various stages of his life. Having attended Christians secondary school and then Rockwell College, Gary left at 15 and began work as a roofer and a plasterer.

"He wasn't academic," Kathryn says, "he worked with his hands and he blossomed."

However, there were ebbs and flows. "Gary was bipolar as well and struggled with his mental health and it took more of a toll on him earlier on in life," Kathryn says. "He was not getting much help from mental health services."

Gary Dineen

There were times when he was "mixing with the wrong crowd", when addiction set in and he was in and out of work.

"Myself and my husband paid for Gary to go to rehab," Kathryn says. "He was clean for two years and he moved to Navan and studied music.

"He was always into his music, rapping and poetry," she explains. "He did music in a college up there for a year, then came back and moved to Limerick and one of my cousins gave him work, he was flying. Then came back to Cork and it all went downhill again."

She can't put her finger on why, exactly, but she has some ideas.

"Gary used to kind of tell me what I wanted to hear, you know that kind of way," she says.

"He tried to help a lot of people when he came back as well. My father had a house in Cork, he gave him one of the apartments to live in. He [Gary] tried to help a lot of people, on the street or just out of prison, and they just took total advantage of him.

"When they were in this one space it all went haywire."

This is a view echoed by one of his old schoolfriends. 
Anto Yau, a musician, said on a public Facebook post in the aftermath of Gary's death that "Gary Dineen (De Don of Hope) would offer me a piece of his last cupcake even if I knew that he was starving but I wouldn't take it obviously, We would have some Irish tea, set him up nicely with a pen and something to write on and I'd get into my zone then we create."

He wrote how Gary's house was "very pleasant cups of tea and music creativity". But it seems something changed, including the company Gary was keeping. De Don of Hope was recorded, but maybe behind the scenes, hope was slipping away.

Michail Moisejenkov's body was found in a tent in Phoenix Park on December 23, aged 31. He was the third homeless person to die in the capital in a nine-day period.

Michail died of an accidental overdose after CPR performed by his friend, April O'Brien, failed. April, a mum of one, died three days later.

Originally from Klaipeda, Lithuania, one of four sons, Michail spoke three languages. He had been homeless in Dublin since 2017, and had been placed in a number of emergency hostels and hotels in the months before his death.

Michail had originally moved to Northern Ireland in 2009 and worked on fishing boats in Portavogie, Co. Down before returning home to Lithuania. In 2013, he fell from a three-story building causing intense brain injury, after which he had to learn to walk and talk again.

When he fully recovered, he returned to Ireland, eventually moving to Dublin.

His close friend Megan, told the Irish Examiner Michail was "the sweetest, gentlest, most lovely person" whom she met when he asked her for change on Grafton Street.

"After we bumped into each other a few times, we started going for coffee, he liked a cappuccino," she said.

"He was a quiet person, very nice when you'd get to know him, every time I met him he would insist on carrying my bags for me, I'd take him to McDonalds and he'd be tidying up the tables, and once he bought me flowers, he had such a harsh life but he had a kind heart. 

"He had a nine year-old daughter who he'd show everyone photos of, he was very proud of her.

"He tried so many things to get housed, he slept in hostels but it was difficult when Covid struck, he couldn't ask people for money as less people were around, it was very difficult.

"It was a nightmare for him, he was alone a lot and slept outside shops at first.

"He slept in Phoenix Park a lot, they had a nightmare with authorities taking their tents and all their belongings, one night after their tent was removed they slept in the open, another night a similar thing happened and they just walked around the streets until the sun came up.

Shy by nature, little is known about the personal life of Ignacy Rybka, a 69-year-old man whose body was found in an alleyway known as Limerick Lane, just off Little Catherine Street, in Limerick’s city centre.

Ignacy, or Iggy as he was known among friends in Limerick’s homeless community, was described as a kind, polite man who spoke little unless he was spoken to.

A source within the community said that Iggy, who was originally from Poland, had recently moved from temporary accommodation, to sharing with a family member and was “doing well”,having come on “leaps and bounds” with his personal battles.

It is unclear as to what led Iggy back to the streets that night, or why he chose to bed down on Limerick Lane instead of in homeless accommodation.

A spokesperson for Limerick City and County Council confirmed that there were beds available on the night Iggy died, a night that saw temperatures drop below freezing.

Two activists, who work with the homeless community in Limerick spoke to him that night, described him as being in good form, and quiet, as he usually was.

“He was very kind and very shy. He wouldn’t come over to talk to you much. He would avoid the crowds,” said Pauline Casey, who began working with the homeless community not long after her own sister passed in similar circumstances to Iggy, not a stone’s throw from Limerick Lane.

Sarah Beasley, an Aontú activist, described Iggy as a quiet gentleman. She also spoke to the 69-year-old that night and said he was a man who would avoid large crowds when he could.

“When we would come to give everyone out some food, he would come over to us and get his food, thank us, he was always very polite, and then go and sit somewhere nearby to eat,” she explained.