Corkman accused of assaulting his wife told gardaí she fell down stairs

A forensic scientist who examined a clump of hair concluded that it had been pulled from a woman’s head, the jury heard yesterday in the trial of a man who denies assault causing serious harm to his wife at the family home.

They also heard evidence of a statement made by the accused to the gardaí, in which he said that he heard his wife falling down the stairs when he was sitting on a couch in the sitting room, also witnessed her falling and hitting her head in the utility room, and on a previous holiday to Dingle, he said, his wife fell against a wall and injured her ribs.

Anthony Kelleher told Detective Garda Thomas O’Sullivan his wife smoked an occasional cigarette but got dizzy when she did.