THE TRIAL of a Co Wicklow bachelor accused of murdering his brother has heard a shotgun found at their house was capable of firing without pulling the trigger.
Cecil Tomkins (63), of New Lodge Nursing Home, Stocking Lane, Rathfarnham, Dublin, has pleaded not guilty at the Central Criminal Court to murdering Walter Tomkins (66), at Cronlea, Shillelagh, Co Wicklow, on July 1st, 2010.
The court previously heard Cecil Tomkins, who has Parkinson’s disease, told a garda he shot his brother Walter, who was also a bachelor, in the house they shared because Walter did not follow their mother’s burial wishes.
It heard their mother Bella Tomkins had been buried days beforehand on June 28th locally in Aghowle with her late husband, but it had been her wish to be buried in Gorey, Co Wexford.
Det Sgt Jarlath Lennon from the Garda Technical Bureau said the gun found at their house was in poor condition. It was held together with wire, and insulating tape was used to hold the wooden stock together.
He agreed with John O’Kelly SC, defending, that when he test-fired the gun, it went off twice without him pulling the trigger.
Under re-examination, he agreed with Dominic McGinn SC, prosecuting, it would take a deliberate action of cocking the gun to make it go off.
The accused’s niece, Carol Tomkins, told the court Cecil “wasn’t happy” about his mother being buried in the local cemetery.
“The previous day Cecil was up in our yard and he wasn’t happy about where she was being buried,” she said.
Ms Tomkins told the court she heard her grandmother had left a letter in which she expressed her wish to be buried in Gorey, but that “Walter hadn’t followed this through”. She told Mr O’Kelly her uncle Walter was a “big man” who would “get red in the face”, and “if things didn’t go Walter’s way he wouldn’t be happy”.
Ms Tomkins agreed with Mr O’Kelly when he said Cecil was “very different to that”, and that “such an act was totally out of character” for him. Even on the farm he’d try and save every last animal,” she said. “If it had been the other way around, I wouldn’t have been as shocked,” she added.
Other witnesses who did farm contract work for Walter Tomkins told the court he was easy to get on with and nearly always happy. He was always telling jokes.
Mark Stamp said he worked for Walter for 11 or 12 years and he never saw any fights between the two brothers.
The court heard evidence from paramedics that there was blood “pooled on the ground” and on Walter Tomkins’s clothing, which was “not very fresh”.
The trial previously heard in Mr McGinn’s opening speech that Deputy State Pathologist Dr Khalid Jabbar said Walter Tomkins died of a shotgun wound to the chest. The trial continues on Monday before a jury of nine men and three women, presided over by Mr Justice Garrett Sheehan.