Update: Megan's on a crusade to clear her beau's name ... Click here

Megan McAllister, the woman engaged to accused Craigslist killer Philip Markoff, is a “sweet Irish girl,” according to Susan Fagan Madalenna, mother of one of Megan’s bridesmaids.

Speaking to IrishCentral.com from her Little Silver, N.J., home, Madellena said that friends and family were "fully behind Megan in her time of need" and that they found the whole story “horrific.”

"We could not believe it when we heard it," she said. “A reporter told me last night, and I was so shocked.” She said the reporters identified her from the couple's Web site wedding page.

Madallena said her daughter and McAllister were best friends from childhood and their families shared pride in their Irish heritage.

“She is a neighbor’s kid, from a great family. I’m just so glad she’s safe.” She described Megan as “a very smart kid, going to medical school, just bright and wonderful.”

Madallena said that TV trucks were parked outside her house in the New Jersey suburb, and that she had been invited to appear on several major TV shows.

“I can’t believe all this has happened," she said.
 
Neither she nor her daughter ever met Markoff, she stated. Megan has gone on record standing by her beau in an interview with the Boston Herald.

Most recently, she sent an email to People defending Markoff: "Philip has not been convicted," she wrote. "A policeman who wished to make money off this story sold it to countless companies. Philip is a beautiful man inside and out and did not commit this crime. Unfortunately, somebody else did and needs to be penalized. Philip was set up and you are wrong to be asking me for stories."

Markoff, a medical student, has been charged with murdering a call girl in a swanky Boston hotel last week, and several other assault charges against women.