A sister of a man accused of murder said her brother just kept saying he did not kill the murdered man, a jury in the Central Criminal Court heard yesterday.
Ms Linda O'Brien, of Gallowsfield, Tralee, Co Kerry, told the court that after reading aloud an account of the murder in a national Sunday paper, her father said the gardai might blame her brother for the murder. "Michael just said he didn't do it. He just kept saying it," she said.
Mr Michael "John the Bobs" O'Brien (27), single and unemployed, of Gallowsfield, has pleaded not guilty to the murder of 16-year-old James Healy of Shanakill, Tralee, at Monavalley Industrial Estate, Tralee, on or about February 22nd, 1997.
The day before Mr Healy's body was found on waste ground, his father went to Mr O'Brien's family home to ask if anyone had seen his son.
Ms O'Brien told the court that as a result of Mr Healy's inquiry, Mr O'Brien allegedly made a remark that "someone killed him with a bar in a field".
In cross-examination, defence counsel Mr Blaise O'Carroll SC asked Ms O'Brien if Mr O'Brien had a good sense of humour and would ever make remarks that were exaggerated, Ms O'Brien said that he would.
When Mr O'Carroll asked if Mr O'Brien's remark was in the "same vein" as a "stupid remark he would normally make," Ms O'Brien said "yes".
Ms O'Brien said her brother and the deceased were "good friends".
She agreed with Mr O'Carroll's suggestion that the two were "good drinking buddies" who would go on "drinking sprees here, there and everywhere".
Giving evidence, Mr James O'Dowd, formerly of Shanakill, Tralee, said he last saw the deceased on Friday evening at around midnight running off to meet the accused man.
Mr O'Dowd told the court that he knew Mr Healy from primary school and from living in the same estate. He said Mr Healy called him over as he approached and asked him for a cigarette.
Mr O'Dowd said he was 100 per cent certain it was Mr Healy, as he was close enough to give him the cigarette and to converse with him. He said: "Definitely it was. I talked to him, like."
Mr O'Dowd said he recognised Mr O'Brien and said he "had been talking" to Mr Healy. "They were talking as I came over and he walked away," he said.
Asked by prosecuting counsel, Mr John Edwards SC, if he knew the second party was Mr O'Brien, Mr O'Dowd said he was "definite, 100 per cent".
In cross-examination, Mr O'Carroll noted that Mr O'Dowd made differing statements to gardai, and challenged his account in court. Accusing Mr O'Dowd of telling a "pack of lies", Mr O'Carroll asked him why he had lied to gardai. Mr O'Dowd said he "didn't want to get involved".
Mr O'Brien and the deceased were allegedly associates who drank cider together occasionally at different places in Tralee.
After having been missing for three days, Mr Healy's body was found on waste ground near a factory off the Monavalley Road.
The State Pathologist, Prof John Harbison, told the court how Mr Healy had had 13 of his teeth knocked out, pieces of his jaw dislodged and had 20 head injuries. Three and a half of Mr Healy's teeth were later found lodged in his windpipe and lungs. Prof Harbison said he believed the teeth were inhaled, causing suffocation. Cause of death was as a result of suffocation, head injuries and shock.
The trial, before Mr Justice Kinlen and a jury of eight women and four men, continues today.