I heard Dundon plan to kill a man, says witness

A 29-year-old Limerick woman has said she heard John Dundon plan a killing a couple of weeks before rugby player Shane Geoghegan was murdered in a case of mistaken identity.

Lisa Collins was giving evidence yesterday at Mr Dundon’s trial, which is in its seventh day at the Special Criminal Court.

The 30-year-old, of Hyde Rd, Limerick, has pleaded not guilty to murdering the Garryowen rugby player on Nov 9, 2008, at Clonmore, Kilteragh.

Lisa Collins testified that in 2008, she shared a house with her partner and Mr Dundon’s cousin, Christopher McCarthy.

She said that a couple of weeks before Mr Geoghegan’s murder, Mr Dundon came to their home with Barry Doyle, referring to the convicted gunman in Mr Geoghegan’s murder.

“John Dundon used to be talking about John McNamara out in Raheen. Pitchfork, he used to call him. Barry asked him what the story was with him,” she said.

“John Dundon said: ‘We’re going to kill the c**t’,” she testified.

She said Mr Dundon also asked her and Christopher McCarthy to steal a car. She said she didn’t know why he wanted the car and that she did not want to steal it, but they did.

She said that she, Mr McCarthy, and another man then stole a car and parked it in an apartment block. She said that she and Mr McCarthy later took Dundon and Doyle to see the car.

She identified herself on CCTV driving behind the stolen car at 5pm on Oct 16 that year.

Ms Collins said she was woken by a phone ringing on the night Mr Geoghegan died. She said there was also knocking at the door.

“It was John Dundon and Barry Doyle. John Dundon was saying that Johnny Mac was dead. He said it a few times. He was laughing.”

She said the next morning she heard about Mr Geoghegan’s murder. She later saw a reconstruction of the crime on television and recognised the car used as the car she had helped steal.

Mr McCarthy also gave evidence.

He said he did not know what use Dundon had for the car he asked him and Ms Collins to get.

“He said he’d kill me or kill my girlfriend if we didn’t. I had to get him a car,” he said.

He said that Mr Dundon and Doyle called to his house again on the night of the murder.

“He [Dundon] was saying: ‘Pitchfork is dead’. I knew he was on about John McNamara,” he said. “Kind of excited he was.”

The trial continues before the non-jury, three-judge court with Justice Nicholas Kearns presiding.