Solicitor to lodge conviction appeal

John Dundon’s solicitor said they would be lodging an appeal to the murder conviction in which they would put forward new evidence showing his innocence.

Solicitor John Devane also said his client was not showing disrespect to the court by listening to music on headphones saying he “didn’t want to over-react” if he was found guilty.

Dundon listened to music on a CD walkman throughout the entire reading of the judgment in the Special Criminal Court. The muffled sound of it was audible throughout the courtroom.

“We believe that Mr Dundon had no act or part in the killing,” said Mr Devane, speaking outside the Courts of Criminal Justice afterwards. “We believe there was new evidence starting to come to light close to the end of the trial when it was too late to introduce it, so we are going to try to put that, assimilate that new evidence, and try and get an appeal on the way based on that.”

He said they did not accept the court’s finding that the evidence of the main prosecution witnesses was compelling, truthful and overwhelming

“He [Dundon] still maintains his innocence and in accordance with his instructions and what we believe, we do believe there is a case there that we can appeal and hopefully prove his innocence in the long term.”

Referring to the murder of Shane Geoghegan, Mr Devane said: “He [Dundon] wasn’t around ... he didn’t have any hand act or part in it and he had nothing to gain by it.”

He alleged that two of the witnesses — Lisa Collins and Christopher McCarthy — were given letters by the DPP granting them immunity from any prosecution.

Mr Devane said that despite proclaiming his innocence, Mr Dundon wanted to express his sympathy to the Geoghegan family.

“We would like to sincerely offer our regrets to the family for the loss of Shane Geoghegan and, indeed, Mr Dundon has actually said that he would like to offer his sympathies and regrets to them as well.”

He said Mr Dundon was not showing disrespect to the court in listening to music. “He wanted to keep himself to himself, he didn’t want to over-react to any adverse outcome and I think if wearing headphones achieves that result for him then that’s okay.

“He just did not want to hear what was going on and hear a tissue of acceptances on the State’s part of what witnesses said about him, he did not want to hear the court accepting that.”