Dublin man denies murdering student

A Dublin man pleaded not guilty in the Central Criminal Court yesterday to the murder of a 17-year-old student in Tallaght last…

A Dublin man pleaded not guilty in the Central Criminal Court yesterday to the murder of a 17-year-old student in Tallaght last year.

Mr Vincent Flynn (19), of Kiltipper Close, Old Bawn, near Tallaght, West Dublin, denied that on May 2nd, 1998, at Killakee Walk, Firhouse, Dublin, he murdered Stephen Morris.

Opening the case, the prosecution counsel, Mr Patrick Gageby SC, told the jury that "simply because [the accused man's] girlfriend expressed the view that she fancied Stephen Morris", the accused stabbed him through the heart, causing him to die. Mr Gageby told the court that "occasionally [she] mentioned to Vincent Flynn that she fancied Stephen Morris, who was by all accounts handsome".

He said this "tragic" case was not concerned with a crime of passion and the deceased had not attempted to "steal" the girlfriend for himself. "Vincent Flynn was a man who had conceived hatred of Stephen Morris out of jealousy," Mr Gageby said.

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Mr Justice Dermot Kinlen later told the jury that the defence counsel, Mr John Edwards SC, had objected to what Mr Gageby had said in his opening address concerning the alleged jealousy of the accused man, on the grounds that it was a distortion of the facts.

Mr Kinlen told the jury there was absolutely nothing wrong with Mr Gageby's address in that he had put forward "the high point of his case", which was yet to be proved, but that they were deciding the case on sworn evidence in the witness box and nothing else.

Outlining the facts of the case, Mr Gageby said "a bit of a row" developed on the night of Mr Morris's death between the accused man and his girlfriend, whereupon he fetched a hunting knife and ran out of the house.

The accused then ran "from area to area until he ended up at the door where Stephen Morris lived," Mr Gageby said. Following an exchange of words the accused stabbed Mr Morris "once down into the heart" and he expired on the street in front of the family home, he said.

The younger brother of the deceased, Mr Rory Morris (17), told the court that on the night his brother was killed, he opened the front door to the accused.

Mr Flynn asked was Stephen Morris home and after telling his brother "someone was at the door for him", Stephen got up and went to the door, he said.

There was "aggressive talk" outside the door, and "when I saw them having a scuffle," he said, "I knew there was something wrong."

The younger brother said: "I saw Stephen lying on the road and Flynn running away brandishing a knife in his right hand."

The Deputy State Pathologist, Dr Marie Cassidy, told the court that the weapon used to inflict the fatal injury would have been held "as a dagger and brought downwards into the body". An 8["] hunting knife later retrieved by gardai could have caused the fatal injury, she said. The cause of death was a stab wound to the aorta.

The trial will resume today.