Priest’s killer back in jail

A MAN who murdered a priest and is serving seven years for threatening to kill a social worker was back behind bars last night after being on the run for five days.

Alan Murray, who had been allowed out to spend Christmas Day with his family, was picked up by gardaí close to his home late on Tuesday night. He is now back in Mountjoy Prison serving the remainder of a seven-year sentence for threatening to kill social worker Rachel Kennedy.

Mountjoy governor John Lonergan will now decide what action to take against 38-year-old Murray, who as a 16-year-old, murdered a priest and was later convicted of manslaughter. Murray, due for release at the end of this year, may lose remission or have privileges, including visits, curtailed.

He was one of a handful of inmates who failed to return to prison after being given temporary release for Christmas. Some 300, just less than 10% of the prison population, were released, for periods ranging from a few hours to a number of days.

The Irish Prison Service said it is not known how many broke the conditions of their temporary release, but that last year two inmates failed to return at the appointed time.

The highly volatile Murray was due back in Mountjoy on Christmas Day but failed to turn up at the gates of the north Dublin prison. Gardaí were alerted and members sent to his family home and it is understood he was not thereat the house. He was finally picked up on Tuesday evening. It is understood staff raised concerns about allowing Murray out as he had returned late when given day release the previous week.

Murray, originally from Moatfield Drive, Coolock, Dublin, was jailed for seven years in January 2000 for threatening to kill Ms Kennedy, with whom he was in a relationship, on July 4th-5th, 1998, and on April 29th, 1999. He was released 10 months later on condition he live with Ms Kennedy.

He was barred from visiting Ms Kennedy’s home the following January but it emerged he stayed at the house on two occasions a month later. He was returned to prison to serve the remainder of the seven-year sentence. Murray spent a number of years in jail and was also treated in the Central Mental Hospital after he killed 62-year-old Fr Seamus Murphy near St Peter’s Church in Phibsboro.