It is over 36 years since German backpacker Inga Maria Hauser was murdered and yet her family are still left without answers about the teenager’s death.
Inga Maria’s body was found in a remote forest in Co Antrim 14 days after she was last seen alive on a ferry travelling from Scotland to Larne.
The 18-year-old’s death in April 1988 remains one of Northern Ireland’s most high-profile unsolved murders.
Before her murder, Ms Hauser had travelled through England and Scotland and, according to diary entries, intended to travel south to Dublin before going to visit a friend in Wales.
Mystery surrounds what happened next and it will be for the inquest — opened in Belfast yesterday — to establish the time and cause of the young Munich woman’s murder.
Ms Hauser’s parents died without ever getting justice for their daughter.
Her sister Friederike — one of her last surviving relatives — observed proceedings at Belfast Coroners Court on Monday by videolink from her home in Germany.
The coroner was told that the family were grateful for the decision to hold the inquest, adding that they had been waiting decades for answers.
“They place their trust and considerable hope in this process,” the barrister added.
Coroner Joe McCrisken acknowledged how long the family had waited for the truth.
“We’ll do everything we can to facilitate an investigation into this lady’s death,” he added.
The PPS made a decision not to charge two people reported to them by the PSNI as having potential involvement in the murder and the subsequent cover-up.
Police have a male genetic profile found at the murder scene but have failed to identify the killer.
The inquest will be able to examine any new evidence uncovered by the PSNI during more recent investigations.
This will be the first time that the evidence will be aired in court and is important that the family, represented locally by solicitor Claire McKeegan, feel that the process is open and transparent.
It will give them answers, but not justice.
There are people who know what happened to Ms Hauser who have kept their gruesome secret for almost 40 years.
They now have a chance to unburden themselves, to do the right thing and give Inga’s sister peace to finally get justice for the young student who travelled to Northern Ireland expecting a friendly welcome but instead met a violent death.