A woman helped her son try to escape his arrest and punishment for a serious assault on his then girlfriend, a court has heard.
Geraldine McMenamy (48) of Donamore Green, Tallaght, Dublin has pleaded not guilty to two charges of assisting an offender by impeding the apprehension or prosecution of her son Paul McMenamy at locations in Dublin on February 8th, 2012.
A jury at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Paul McMenamy assaulted his then partner Nicola Murray on February 5th, 2012. Three days later, he was arrested at a hotel close to Dublin airport with a one-way ticket for a flight to Manchester and €600 cash.
Gerard Clarke SC, prosecuting, said it is the State’s case that the accused took her son to the airport and gave him €400 cash to help him escape. Her son had already been arrested and questioned, but was released without charge before his arrest at the airport.
Mr McMenamy later pleaded guilty to assault causing serious harm to Ms Murray, and in 2013 he was sentenced to six years with one suspended. He was previously jailed in 2010 for an assault on another woman.
His mother told gardaí that on the morning after the 2012 assault, her son telephoned her and told her Ms Murray had hit her head during a row the night before. The accused went to the house and saw Ms Murray lying on the floor of the bedroom. She had two black eyes and her eyes were closed. Ms McMenamy said her son told her the victim had hit her head while climbing over the bed to attack him with a knife.
“I didn’t know what to believe, I kept saying I hope you didn’t do this. I was really really upset,” she told gardaí in a statement.
She told them she suspected he had caused the injuries to the victim because of his history and said she was in fear of her son. “I can’t put my finger on it but there’s something wrong with Paul. He punched me and threatened me with a knife. He told me he’d slit my throat.”
She said that on a scale of one to 10 she would put her fear of her son at 100.
She said that when he asked her and her husband to take him to the airport she was hesitant because she feared being “an accessory”.
“Paul kept saying well I wasn’t charged with anything. I’m a free man. I have to get out of the country or else I’ve to come back to your house,” she told gardaí.
She said she told him he wasn’t coming back to her house.
In March 2012, a month after making these statements to gardaí, the accused told gardaí she was not in fear of her son, saying: “I’m retracting my statement where I said I was afraid of Paul.”