THE JURY in the trial of a Sligo man accused of murdering a 14-year-old girl has been told that it will hear from the accused man’s daughter that she saw him tie the schoolgirl’s body up in a sleeping bag and throw it in a river.
Ronald McManus (44), also known as Ronnie Dunbar, of Rathbraughan Park, Sligo, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Melissa Mahon in Co Sligo between September 14th and 30th, 2006.
He also denies threatening to kill or cause serious harm to his daughter during the same period.
Isobel Kennedy SC, prosecuting, opened the trial by telling the jury that a daughter of the accused man would give evidence that Melissa Mahon was her friend and that she came home to find her father and Melissa lying on a bed with her father’s arm around Melissa’s neck.
Ms Kennedy said that the daughter would say her father put Melissa into a sleeping bag which he tied with a man’s tie and put into the boot of his car.
The accused allegedly drove with two daughters in the car to the river Bonnet where he allegedly threw Melissa’s body into the river. It will be alleged that he then brought his daughters to football, Ms Kennedy said.
Melissa Mahon was the youngest child in a family of ten, said Ms Kennedy
Her parents were from Sligo but had moved to England in 1969. The family returned to Ireland in the summer of 2005. Melissa and a sister attended school and became close friends with two daughters of the accused.
The Dunbar family lived on the same estate and Ms Kennedy told the jury that it would hear that Melissa spent a lot of time in the accused man’s house.
Ms Kennedy said that Melissa ran away from home on a number of occasions and that a social worker had become involved. In August 2006 the girl ran away from home and was later taken into residential care.
On September 14th, 2006 Melissa was due to be taken by a social worker to a foster home.
She left the care of the social worker when she was went to a bathroom to change her clothes and was not seen again.
The court heard that in January 2008 gardaí spoke to the accused man’s daughter after receiving information.
Melissa’s remains were found on the shore of Lough Gill in Sligo in the following weeks. Ms Kennedy said bones, a sleeping bag and a nightdress were among the items recovered.
Mary Mahon, the mother of the deceased, said her daughter called to the accused man’s house “all the time” after school and at weekends. She said Mr Dunbar took Melissa, her sister and two of his daughters in his car to places like Rosses Point and Strandhill.
Mrs Mahon said that in August 2006 Melissa left her home during the night and was found in the shed of the Dunbar house with one of the accused man’s daughters. Mrs Mahon said she slapped her daughter on the back when she found her there.
The following day Melissa again left home and Mrs Mahon rang gardaí and said her daughter was probably in the accused man’s house. She was missing on that occasion for three weeks.
Under cross-examination Mrs Mahon agreed with Brendan Grehan SC, defending, that her family had been engaged with social services in England and two older daughters were on the child protection register there.
Mrs Mahon agreed with Mr Grehan that she was aware that Melissa had alleged that she had been abused physically by her mother and sexually by her father.
She also agreed that she declined to make a statement to gardaí in relation to her daughter being missing and said, “it wasn’t up to me, she wasn’t in my care”.
Mrs Mahon agreed that she told the social worker that Melissa no longer had any family and that she threatened to beat Melissa if she saw her.
Melissa’s sister Leeanna (19) told the court that she and Melissa visited the Dunbars nearly every day. She told Ms Kennedy that on one occasion the accused asked Melissa to rub Vaseline on to a tattoo on his arm and that they would often sit on the sofa together.
Ms Mahon said she saw the accused lying on the sofa with Melissa sitting between his legs with her head on his chest. She told the court that after Melissa went missing she found a photo of the accused in a box in Melissa’s bedroom.
The trial continues.