A MURDER-accused told a trial yesterday: “I am heartbroken over my friend, I cannot understand how he died — I wasn’t hitting him that hard.”

THE palm print of a woman on trial for murdering a young man in Cork two years ago was found on the broken handle of a sweeping brush at the dead man’s flat.

THE man on trial for murder in Cork told gardaí that he did not ring an ambulance, priest or gardaí the next morning when he found that the young man was not breathing and said that instead he got a fright and left the flat.

THE jury in the murder trial taking place at the Central Criminal Court heard a recording of a phone call between the two accused yesterday.

THE man who denies murdering a Fermoy man two years ago spoke to a detective on a car journey to a court and said: “I fucked up badly. I gave him a few slaps alright. He owed me about €500.”

THE employer who allegedly told his employee that he would not pay her when she was serving on the jury of murder trial apologised yesterday and said she would be paid.

THE man and woman on trial in Cork for murder had been on the run for a few days before gardaí found them in Tralee, Cork Circuit Criminal Court was told yesterday.

THE body of a Fermoy man was found on waste ground off a side road in Kerry with his hands bound in front of him with a white shoelace, the murder trial jury heard yesterday.

A GARDA spotted a shovel in a car and jokingly asked the driver if it was for burying a body — the driver is now on trial for murder.

THE victim in a murder trial was looking for €600 or €700 – possibly for drugs – on the day he disappeared, his mother and father have told the jury.

The trial of a man and woman accused of murdering a young Fermoy man at his flat in Cork city two years ago has opened in Cork this afternoon

A man and a woman were charged today with murdering 25-year-old Fermoy man, John McManus, at a flat in Cork city in October 2008 – amid tearful scenes in and around Cork District Court.