Niece of missing Esra Uyrun says finding her dead is the least horrific scenario

Esra disappeared after leaving her Dublin home 12 years ago this week

She was last seen leaving her home in Collinstown Grove in Clondalkin, Dublin where she lived with her husband Ozgur and two-year-old son Emin around 7.15am. on February 23, 2011.

Her car – a silver Renault Twingo, registration number ‘08 D 23067’ – was later found in a car park at the bottom of Bray Head in Co Wicklow but CCTV couldn’t determine who was driving the vehicle. Her wallet was found in the trunk of the car.

Esra was from a Turkish family and grew up in London but had moved to Ireland after her husband got a job here.

Her family including her sister Berna, who live in London, regularly travel to Ireland in the search for answers and will fly in tomorrow and spend the week here pleading for information on the 12th anniversary of her disappearance.

Berna’s daughter Ayda, who was 17 when Esra disappeared, turns 30 this year and is constantly thinking of the times she could have had with her bubbly auntie over the past 12 years.

She said Esra was the “light of the family” and was always meeting up with relatives and inviting them over to Ireland.

“I was 17 at the time and now I’m 29. It feels like a lifetime ago. It’s hard because I feel like it’s a constant thing. If someone was found or were dead it would be easier. If someone is missing there is a chance she could be locked up in a dungeon somewhere for 25 or 30 years. It’s not completely unheard of. Anything is on the table. I think that’s the hardest part.”

She said she and the rest of Esra’s family have all run through horrendous scenarios in their heads of what could have happened to her.

“If I’m honest, about a year after she went missing, all I was praying for her was for her to be found dead because I was thinking anything else would be awful at that point. It’s worse as time goes on and it’s 12 years now.

“If she was one of these people who was trafficked or kidnapped or anything like that god forbid the thought of what she would have been suffering.

“After a while it wasn’t even the hope, it was the hope she was actually at peace.”

She said the family think about Esra constantly particularly around anniversaries, birthdays and family occasions.

“What makes it harder was she was such a family person. She was the big light of the family and so talkative and bubbly. She was the one who always wanted to plan things and do things.”

Before she moved to Ireland she’d be in her family’s houses once or twice a week and always been on the phone and when she moved to Ireland, she’d either return to London to visit every six weeks or invite family to Dublin.

“However busy she was she was always thinking of other people. I’ve never met such a people person.”

She said she looked up to Esra so much and thought she was the coolest auntie who she always wanted to spend time with,

“I always imagined being older and wanting to go out her. She went missing around the time I started to have more freedom to be an adult and enjoy life with her. I got that taken away from me.”

Berna said the entire family are going through torture not knowing what happened.

“As you can see it’s affecting everybody. Everyone feels it,” Berna said.

“I just want someone to come forward and say they’ve been holding onto a secret and are finally going to tell me. I know someone knows.”