Jury begins deliberations in trial of man who killed poker opponent

A jury has retired to consider its verdict in the murder trial of a Cavan meat factory worker, who killed his poker opponent with a knife from the factory’s ‘kill floor’.

Tomasz Paszkiewicz (39) has pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to the manslaughter of fellow Polish man Marek Swider (40) at their home on Dublin Street, Ballyjamesduff on January 1st, 2018. The trial has heard that the farm worker died of two stab wounds to his upper body.

The defendant admits the killling but denies murder, and his barrister told the jury that no decision it would make would ever have the same impact as his client remembering that he was responsible for the death.

Both counsel delivered their closing speeches on Wednesday,

The Central Criminal Court heard that he used his 'kill floor' boning knife to stab his housemate after losing hundreds of euro to him in a New Year's Eve poker game.

Sean Guerin SC, prosecuting, said premeditation was not necessary to show the necessary intent for murder. He noted that the killing did not have the hallmarks of premeditation. The accused had used his work knife, engraved with his employee number, and had dropped it at the scene, he said.

Mr Guerin said that the story of Mr Swider’s death was a very tragic, but a very simple one.

“A man, who got drunk playing cards for money, lost his money and became angry with the man who won the money from him. He tried to take it back and was rebuffed,” he began. “In his anger and covetousness for that money, he brought that man outside, armed himself with the knife and gave Marek Swider no chance. There was no fight. There was barely even an argument.

“Mr Swider didn’t lay an arm on him and barely had an opportunity to defend himself.”

The barrister described it as ‘an efficient and brutally effective killing’.

“Whatever was in his mind when he first stabbed Mr Swider, when he pulled the knife out and plunged it in a second time, can there have been anything else in his mind at that moment other than an intention to kill or cause serious injury?” he asked. “The prosecution says this is murder.”

Ken Fogarty SC, defending, reminded the jury that his client had not initially known that Mr Swider had died.

He had turned himself into gardaí within three days of the stabbing, saying: ‘Arrest me. I killed a man’.

“If you think that this was anything other than a trivial use of the knife on the night, I respectfully suggest you don’t know enough about Tomasz Paszkiewicz,” he said. “He doesn’t remember how the knife got into his hand.”

Mr Fogarty reminded the jury that witnesses had described his client as a calm, well-balanced person, who never got angry and tended to help people.

“What the prosecution are urging upon you is that the thin line of the proof required to show the intent was there, present, when they stood face to face and one foot apart,... a split second in time,” he said.

“I want you to remember that this is only the earthly court,” he said. “No matter what decision you make, you will never ever have the same impact that he has to remember that from his own home city in Poland, he’s responsible for the death of Marek.”

He said that walls and prison bars did not a prison make. “He is going to have to account for that in another court at another time,” he said.

“I do say respectfully they (the prosecution) haven’t made out the case of intent sufficient to move this from a charge of manslaughter to murder. I ask you to find accordingly.”

Ms Justice Tara Burns sent the seven men and five women of the jury out to begin their deliberations in the afternoon. They had spent more than an hour and a half considering their verdict before going home for the night and will return to court on Thursday morning.