The Indo Daily

At around midnight on August 5 2025, the lifeless body of Irish woman Martha Nolan-O’Slatarra was discovered on a boat docked at a marina in the exclusive Montauk Yacht Club in the US. Originally from Co Carlow, the 33-year-old entrepreneur had moved to New York ten years previously and was forging a successful career in sunglasses and swimwear design.
Earlier that evening, Martha had arranged to meet with millionaire investor Christopher Durnan to discuss how her business was going. In an interview last year, Durnan’s lawyer claimed that his client told police that Martha suddenly went limp between 10.30pm and 11pm and that he thought she was having a heart attack.
According to witnesses, Durnan was seen at around midnight, running naked through the marina, screaming for help. On the first anniversary of Martha’s tragic death, her family filed a wrongful death proceedings for $50 million against Christopher Durnan.
Their lawyers have stated that the results of an independent postmortem examination commissioned by the Nolan family is at odds with the one carried out by the state of New York and their summons is seeking damages for wrongful death and for the personal injuries and conscious pain and suffering that Martha sustained before her death.
On Tuesday, legal filings made on Mr Duran’s behalf revealed that James E Mercante, of New York law firm Gallo Vitucci Klar, will be appearing as his lawyer in the case.
Mr Mercante specialises in commercial and recreational admiralty consultation and litigation, marine insurance coverage, transportation disputes, arbitration and appeals.
The New York City-based maritime lawyer has handled such high-profile cases as the sinking of the Kandi Won in Oyster Bay, New York, on July 4, 2012, in which three children drowned, and the 2014 case in which a powerboat struck a barge moored at the Tappan Zee Bridge on the Hudson River in New York, killing two people.
Lawyers for Ms Nolan-O’Slatarra’s family filed a “Summons with Notice” in New York County on three weeks ago on August 4, seeking damages for “wrongful death” as well as damages for the “personal injuries and conscious pain and suffering” she sustained before her death.
According to court documents, the actions arise from events that took place on August 4 and 5 last year aboard a vessel docked at the Star Island Yacht Club at 32 Star Island Road in Montauk, New York.
Today on The Indo Daily, Catherine Fegan , Special Correspondent for the Irish Independent, joins Tessa Fleming to discuss the latest developments in the case.
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This podcast description was edited on 1pm on Thursday August 27th to include details regarding the boat accident specialist. This is not featured in the podcast discussion, however.
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They’re coming home.
Having sent shockwaves through the British royal family and beyond back in 2020 by swapping out gilded titles for the California sunshine, Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, have once again stolen headlines thanks to their shock imminent return to the UK.
Why the move? Well, that's the question of the day.
In the absence of a clarifying statement, speculation about the homecoming is rampant, with the rumour mill grinding together everything from their children's education to potential familial reconciliation to a return to acting.
One thing is for certain, though: it won't be a quiet, clandestine comeback.
“I reported [on the royals] all through the Nineties, and that’s when we first started calling the royal family a soap opera, and now we’re kind of back there again,” says former BBC royal correspondent Jennie Bond on the Indo Daily.
“There are going to be headlines everywhere, as far as I can see, for the next few months about Harry and Meghan and the royal family, but not the kind of headlines that the rest of the royal family would want.”
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The fallout continues from the horrific crash on the M9 motorway two Sundays ago.
Three sisters – Niamh Kinsella, Alma Kinsella, Ella Hendricken, and a seven-year-old boy – remain in hospital.
Five young men – Jeremy O'Brien, Alex McCarthy, Joe Carthy, Kamil Pustkowski, and Jack Kennedy - lost their lives.
The incident captured the attention and emotions of the nation. Concern, alarm, fear, outrage – all have been thoroughly expressed in recent days.
Now, as the five teenage boys are laid to rest, a similar incident in England has provoked fresh anxiety, after a wrong-way car crash near Middlesbrough in the early hours of Saturday morning left seven people dead, including two police officers.
On this episode of The Indo Daily, host Fionnán Sheahan is joined by Irish Independent journalist Conor Feehan to look at the latest from the M9 crash, and by Irish Independent features writer Kim Bielenberg to examine the scourge of joyriding in society over the years.
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As criminal underworld nicknames go, ‘The Milkman’ certainly stands out.
The moniker may conjure cartoonish imagery, but the reality was quite simple – Brian Brendan Wright always delivered.
Having swapped out Cork for London at the age of 12, Wright grew up in a working-class Irish community before carving out a distinctive personality for himself.
In time, he would boast quite the collection of acquaintances, rubbing shoulders with celebrity names like Frank Sinatra, Clint Eastwood and Michael Caine, while also emerging as a well-respected “gentleman gangster” in the criminal underworld.
And so it was that when a suspicious yacht anchored in Cobh, Co Cork, on a stormy September night in 1996, investigators eventually found themselves on the trail of The Milkman.
On this episode of The Indo Daily, host Kevin Doyle is joined by Irish Independent southern correspondent Ralph Riegel to look at how an Irish expat built a global drugs empire and how it all came spilling down around him.
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This episode is brought to you by our sister podcast Money Talks. New episodes land every Wednesday.
Regular listeners to Money Talks will know that the show has always focused on the personal side of personal finance. Now we’re really putting our money where our mouth is with our new Money Makeover series.
Financial expert Cian Carolan joins Katie Byrne to apply the actionable advice from Money Talks to real-life circumstances faced by our listeners.
On this episode, he focuses on a couple with very different saving styles – and a looming time crisis on their pension pot.
Host: Katie Byrne | Guest: Cian Carolan
The content of this podcast is for information purposes and does not constitute investment advice or recommendation of any investment product.


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