TWO MEN have been convicted of the murder of John Mongan, who was killed in February last year in front of his pregnant wife and daughter.
Christopher Stokes (34), Great James Street, Derry, and Edward Stokes (38), Cornshell Fields, Derry, were also unanimously convicted yesterday of causing criminal damage to Mr Mongan’s Mitsubishi Shogun vehicle, which was parked outside his home on Fallswater Street, Belfast.
However, the jurors, five men and seven women at Belfast Crown Court, told trial judge Mr Justice Treacy that they had not reached verdicts on the murder and criminal damage charges faced by a 16-year-old who cannot be identified, or on the wounding charge faced by Edward Stokes.
When the foreman of the jury announced the guilty verdicts for the two men, the Mongan family clapped and cheered.
About two dozen police officers and security staff separated them from the Stokes family in the public gallery, while the judge repeatedly asked them to “keep quiet” until the proceedings had been completed.
After a short break, the judge told the jury to “completely disregard” the outbursts it had witnessed from the families.
The jury will return today to continue its deliberations.
Since the trial began on October 21st, the jury has heard that father-of-three Mr Mongan was hacked to death after a gang smashed its way into his home in the early hours of February 7th last year.
Julia Mongan, who was due to give birth the next day, told the court she pleaded with them not to attack her husband but that both she and her seven-year-old daughter witnessed him being murdered. She later named all three defendants as the killers.
During evidence, the jury heard how a mobile phone belonging to Christopher Stokes had been tracked leaving Derry, going to west Belfast at the time of the killing, moving on to Kesh, where an Isuzu Trooper allegedly used as a getaway vehicle was found burned out, and then returning to Derry.
They also heard that a shirt belonging to Edward Stokes was found to have a small blood smear on the back of it which, when examined, had an exact match to the DNA of Mr Mongan.
Mr Mongan’s body was examined by the assistant state pathologist for Northern Ireland, Dr Peter Ingram, who said he had identified between 40 and 50 incised wounds which had been inflicted by at least two bladed weapons, possibly an axe and a sword.