The killers of a Limerick man beat him about the head with a sawn-off shotgun after shooting him three times, the State pathologist told a jury yesterday.
Giving evidence in the trial of Mr Noel Kelly, accused of being one of two attackers who murdered illegal moneylender Mr John Keane, Dr John Harbison said that after the wooden stock of the gun broke in the assault, the metal part was used to inflict more head and facial injuries.
Mr Keane was still alive when his skull was fractured, the pathologist said. He died from bleeding to the brain due to head injuries and bleeding in his chest caused by a lethal shotgun wound to the left side.
In the trial before Mr Justice Quirke, Mr Noel Kelly (22), denied the murder of Mr Keane (26), at the bungalow they shared in O'Malley Park, Limerick City, in the early hours of July 5th, 1996. Mr Kelly also denied charges of unlawfully and maliciously causing grievous bodily harm and possession of a single-barrel shotgun with intent to endanger life.
The jury heard from Det Thomas Carey of the Ballistics Unit of the Garda Technical Bureau that he believed Mr Keane was first shot in his bedroom-kitchenette. He was again shot and beaten on the head and face on the green outside his house. Two spent cartridges and the stock of the gun were found beneath his body at the scene. A sawn-off single-barrel shotgun was found in a hedge in nearby Larkin Drive. Det Carey said tests of the two cartridges showed they were fired by a shotgun other than the single-barrelled one. The other shotgun was never recovered.
Mr Kelly at the time, of the murder, said that Noel Kelly he called to her house to see Sinead between midnight and 12.15 a.m. and left between a quarter- past and half-past one.
Mr Kelly's counsel have said he will claim he has an alibi for the time of the killing, at around 3 a.m.
Ms Sinead Hickey, who was seeing Mr Kelly at the time, agreed with Mr Kelly's barrister, Mr George Birmingham SC, that sometimes when she called to the house Mr Kelly shared with Mr Keane, she just had to push on the door to gain entry. The jury has heard Mr Keane was very security-conscious and had a steel sheet fitted to the inside of his door.
The prosecution allege Mr Kelly left the door unlocked to facilitate entry for the killing. The trial continues.
