Police had no proof man cut up mother’s body, murder trial told

A defence lawyer claimed police found no evidence an Irish man cut up his mother’s body despite “CSI in spades”, a jury in Edinburgh was told yesterday.

However, the prosecution said it was a classic case of circumstantial evidence where the strands all came together.

James Dunleavy denies murdering his mother Philomena (66), from Marino, Dublin, between April 30th and May 7th last year.

He also denies attempting to defeat justice by trying to cover up the alleged murder and destroy evidence. At the time, Mr Dunleavy was living in a flat on Edinburgh’s Balgreen Road.

The murder charge alleges he inflicted “blunt force trauma” by means unknown, compressed his mother’s throat and cut off her head and legs with a blade and something like a saw.

A second charge – now amended – accuses Mr Dunleavy of transporting his mother’s dismembered body to a secluded clearing on nearby Corstorphine Hill and burying her there. In his closing speech at the high court, defence QC Gordon Jackson said Mr Dunleavy (40), had a very simple response to the crown case: “I never.”

Mr Jackson continued: "Nothing could be simpler than that. He says, 'I didn't do any of it. I didn't kill her, I didn't harm her, I didn't do anything to her body and I did not bury her.'"

'Prime suspect'
The lawyer admitted Mr Dunleavy was the "prime suspect" but told jurors that suspicion was not enough to convict.

“It is not a court of prejudice or a court of bias, it is a court of law,” he told them.

Mr Jackson recalled how police and forensic scientists had given evidence about their thorough search of the flat where Ms Dunleavy was staying with her son.

“CSI in spades. They did it to the nth degree,” he said. They had used blood-revealing chemical Luminol, special lighting and taken up the flooring.

“You could not imagine a more intense, detailed examination for something that might have been cleared up.

“What did they find? Nothing.”

Mr Jackson went on to argue that even if the crown could prove beyond reasonable doubt that Mr Dunleavy buried his mother, they could not prove he killed her. He also said that if the jury went against him, Mr Dunleavy’s mental state was such that the verdict should be guilty of a reduced charge of culpable homicide, not murder.

The jury is expected to be asked to begin considering its verdicts today after judge Lord Jones has given legal directions.

Earlier, prosecuting lawyer Alex Prentice QC began his closing speech to the jury by saying Mr Dunleavy had indeed done “something bad”.

Workmate Matthew Hagan (26) claims Mr Dunleavy made the comment to him just days before his arrest.

Circumstantial
Mr Prentice went on to tell the jury that the case against Mr Dunleavy was a circumstantial one in which pieces of evidence came together like strands in a cable.

“This is a classic case of that type,” said the prosecutor. There will be some unanswered questions in this case, some unresolved issues.” He suggested some of the jury might have hoped at the beginning of the trial that it would be interesting. “But as is often the case in our courts there is a great deal of tragedy and misery unfolding which you have to hear.”