FOR SIX DAYS during the summer of 2020, the city of Belfast held its breath and prayed that missing 14-year-old Noah Donohoe would be found alive. It was a story that united a divided community who poured out of their homes in extraordinary numbers, regardless of religious or political beliefs, to support the search effort for the popular missing schoolboy. However, despite their best efforts, with every passing day, hope ebbed.

Noah’s distraught mother, Fiona, explained that her son had left home to meet his friends on his bicycle in the late afternoon on Father’s Day—a journey that was never completed—prompting her to raise the alarm. The next day his clothes and bike were found in a Protestant enclave of north Belfast, a part of the city he had never been before; an area where few Catholics would go, especially in the heat of the Orange marching season. Inexplicably, CCTV footage quickly revealed that Noah had cycled into that area—Northwood Road—at around 6pm on the 21st of June—the day of his disappearance. Shortly afterwards, further footage would catch a glimpse of him naked, cycling furiously into a cul-de-sac on the estate. Tragically, six days later, his body was found in a secluded storm drain 100 metres away.

The mystery of what happened to Noah Donohoe, a smiling, much-loved teenage schoolboy still captivates the public who want answers to this inexplicable tragedy. Every time the story is featured, it makes front page news and paper sales soar.

With exclusive access to the family and their legal team, and full access to all the inquest material, hundreds of statements and every text message sent by Noah and his friends and all the public responses on the case, Donal MacIntyre reveals the definitive untold account of one of the most talked about news stories of modern times.