A 24-YEAR-OLD Dublin man has gone on trial for the murder of a Wexford man in a Rosslare caravan park on Easter Sunday morning two years ago.
Stephen Delaney, of Belclare Grove, Ballymun, has pleaded not guilty to murdering 37-year-old Anthony Cullen on April 8th, 2007, but admits unlawfully killing him at Burmah Caravan Park in the seaside town.
Paul O Higgins SC, prosecuting, described the background to the case as somewhat squalid and debauched, involving a lot of drinking. He told the jury that Cullen had been drinking for most of the day in Wexford when he was invited to a mobile home in Rosslare. Stephen Delaney was in the caravan with some friends.
The victim was extremely drunk and got into a number of small fights, he said. Cullen soiled himself and was thrown out of the caravan. Mr O’Higgins said it was the State’s case that as he was leaving the caravan park, Stephen Delaney armed himself with a knife and pursued him, stabbing him three times in the back, each time piercing a lung.
Cullen’s best friend, Aidan Duggan, told the court they began drinking in Wexford on Easter Saturday morning. They drank all day and caught the 9pm train to Rosslare. He said they were drunk and took ecstasy. He said that some time after Cullen, whom he called Kojak, was put outside, he went to see how he was. “I could see Kojak on the ground outside the door. Stephen Delaney was standing in the doorway. They were outside laughing at him,” he said. “I picked him up and said to Stephen Delaney: ‘F**k off, that’s not the way we do it here.’ He went mad.”
Mr Duggan later agreed that he had also told Mr Delaney to f**k himself and his caravan before sticking up his fingers at him. He said Mr Delaney had asked him to repeat what he’d said. He and Mr Cullen then started walking up a lane away from the caravan when he heard Mr Delaney saying: “Get the blades. Get the blades”.
“When I came back around the corner, he was on the ground,” he said of the victim. “I picked him up by the head and tried to keep the man alive.” Mr Duggan also accepted that he had fought with Cullen that night.
The trial continues.