Meryn O’Brien, who lost her 25-year-old son Jack, said: “Everyone was relieved the process was over, and it’s very fair and it’s been thorough.” Judges in The Hague ruled Thursday that Russians Igor Girkin and Sergey Dubinskiy and Ukrainian national Leonid Kharchenko instigated a July 17, 2014, missile attack that killed all 298 people on board. The fourth defendant, Oleg Pulatov, the only one with defense lawyers, was acquitted. Michael and Carol Clancy were among 38 Australians who died when the plane traveling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down over eastern Ukraine. Michael’s brother Brian, from Singleton, New South Wales, gave a victim impact statement which was read to the court, while Carol’s daughter Jane Malcolm was in Holland to hear the verdicts. “To this day I feel empty. My brother and I did everything together,” Bryan Clancy’s statement read. “I couldn’t open up, explain how Mick’s murder devastated me. I just can’t talk about it because it’s too raw and no one can understand the feeling of loss, anger, terror and helplessness that I continue to experience. “I don’t think I will ever be able to come to terms with this senseless act of mass murder.” Sister Philomene Tiernan was another of the Australian victims and a statement from her sister, Madeleine Wright, was also read. “My dearest older sister, my only surviving sibling, has been trashed. A life taken in a moment, a one in a million chance. “I felt angry that he was on MH17, which had chosen to fly from Amsterdam, not take the usual route back to Australia via London. I think about Phil every day. We lived in different cities, but Phil managed to attend important family events. We saw each other often [and] he spoke every week on the phone. “Since Phil’s death I haven’t liked flying, Phil is always next to me on the plane and life seems so fragile.” Also present in court was the deputy chief of the Australian Federal Police, Peter Crozier, who led the Australian investigation into the killers. More than 500 AFP officers have been involved in the investigation. Speaking outside court, Crozier said he had full confidence in the impartiality, independence and professionalism of the Dutch legal system. “The issuance of these verdicts is an important milestone in our collective efforts to hold those responsible accountable,” he said.
