Pellets narrowly missed baby girl in shotgun attack

A four-week-old baby narrowly escaped shotgun pellets which hit the seat in which she had been placed earlier, a court heard.

A Limerick man was also wounded in the shooting outside his home.

Ian Horgan, aged 30, with an address at 68 Lenihan Avenue, Limerick, has pleaded not guilty at Limerick Circuit Court with possessing a shotgun with intent to endanger life on December 12, 2013.

Sean Finnan, who was 26 at the time, was wounded when two shots were fired as he had a smoke at the door of a house at Byrne Avenue, Prospect, at around 9.30pm.

His ex-partner Leanne Casey, mother of Mr Finnan’s then four-week old-daughter, gave evidence yesterday of how pellets struck the headrest of the baby car seat where their daughter was sitting in a front room.

Ms Casey was at home on the night of the attack with Mr Finnnan and her two children, the four-week-old baby she had with Mr Finnan and her older boy, aged two.

She put her son to bed upstairs and the baby was in a car seat in the sitting room where she gave her a bottle.

They watched TV and Sean Finnan went out to the front door for a smoke as he did not want to smoke in the house with the baby.Ms Casey went out to get a ‘pull’ off Mr Finnan’s cigarette.

Two men appeared outside the garden gate, one standing in front of the other.

Ms Casey could not see the second man, but said the one standing in front was the accused, Ian Horgan. She knew him to see as he often walked around Prospect with his partner, Teresa O’Neill.

She said Ian Horgan produced a gun and fired.

She said she ducked behind Sean Finnan; Ian Horgan came half way in the front garden and fired again.

She said Mr Horgan was wearing a scarf over his face and when he fired the second shot the scarf fell and that was when she knew who it was. Six pellets hit the headrest of the seat where she had placed the baby earlier.

She went upstairs as her son was screaming.

Mr Finnan ran into house, leaving a trail of blood. He was taken to hospital to have the pellets removed.

Asked in cross-examination by defence counsel, Brian McInerney about Sean Finnan’s enemies over drug-dealing activities, she said she did not know of enemies over drugs, but he might not have told her everything.

And if Mr Finnan had enemies, she told the court, why should they bring it to her door.

She agreed she had a drugs conviction and had previously obstucted gardaí at her parents’ home.

The trial continues.