The Special Criminal Court will give its verdict in the trial of Mr Brian Meehan, the man accused of murdering the journalist Veronica Guerin, next Thursday.
Defence submissions in the trial concluded yesterday and Mr Justice Morris, presiding, said the court would give its verdict in the case on Thursday, July 29th.
Mr Meehan has been remanded in custody until then.
During the 31-day day trial the court heard evidence from four people currently in the Witness Protection Programme, Charles Bowden, Mrs Juliet Bowden, Russell Warren and John Dunne. Warren alleged that he provided the stolen motorcycle used in the murder and that Mr Meehan had collected it from him on the day of the killing. He also claimed that he had followed Ms Guerin from Naas courthouse on June 26th, 1996, and had witnessed her murder.
He told the court that he had been in mobile phone contact with Mr Meehan, who was the driver of the motorcycle, minutes before the murder and had informed him of Ms Guerin's location.
Charles Bowden claimed that Mr Meehan instructed him to load a Magnum revolver with six bullets the day before the murder and that on June 26th, 1996, Mr Meehan had told him that he had been involved in the murder.
Mr Meehan (34), of no fixed abode, and formerly of Clifton Court, Dublin, and Stanaway Road, Crumlin, Dublin, has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Ms Guerin (36) at Naas Road, Clondalkin, Dublin, on June 26th, 1996.
Prosecuting counsel Mr Eamonn Leahy SC in his closing submission said that Mr Meehan was central to a major criminal enterprise to import and distribute hundreds of kilograms of cannabis, and this was the background to the murder.
He said that the accomplice evidence provided by Charles Bowden, Russell Warren, John Dunne and Mrs Bowden was corroborated by other evidence. In three days of defence submissions Mr Meehan's counsel, Mr John McCrudden QC, claimed that Bowden was the gunman who had shot Ms Guerin and that he had tried to shift the blame to Mr Meehan. Mr McCrudden also said that the evidence of the four State witnesses was suspect and could not be relied upon to convict Mr Meehan.
Mr Meehan is the second man to stand trial for the murder of the Sunday Independent crime reporter. Last November Paul Ward from Walkinstown in Dublin was jailed for life after he was convicted by the Special Criminal Court of Ms Guerin's murder.