Deaf man 'made 999 sign' before death

A deaf man who was found dead in a country laneway in 1998 had earlier made the "999 sign" with his finger after sustaining a beating, a murder trial jury heard today.

Ms Bernadette Fitzgerald, the former girlfriend of Mr William Roche, a 23 year-old man accused of the murder of 21 year-old John Carroll was giving evidence at the second day of his trial at the Central Criminal Court.

Mr Roche, a native of Limerick with an address at Millstream, Killaloe, Co Clare has denied the murder of Mr Carroll, Cappamore, Co Limerick on December 4, 1998 at Garraun, Ballinahinch, Newport, Co Tipperary.

Ms Fitzgerald told Mr Dominic McGinn BL for the prosecution that she was friendly with the deceased for over two years at the time of his death. On the night of December 3 she was drinking with Mr Carroll, her then boyfriend, Mr Roche and a number of others in a pub in Killaloe, Co Clare.

She said that Mr Roche and Mr Carroll seemed to be getting along well, and that Mr Carroll kept telling the accused that he was only friends with Ms Fitzgerald, that there was nothing going on between them. She said there was no trouble between the accused and Mr Carroll.

After the pub they went to her sister’s house in a nearby housing estate. "John was playing with my nephew and handed him £1," she said. The accused and a second man were talking and she couldn’t hear what they were saying. Suddenly, Mr Carroll ran out of the house and she followed him.

"John told me the two boys were going to jump him," she told the court. Mr Roche and the other man came out of the house and she said she thought, "they were probably going to rob him or beat him up".

Ms Fitzgerald tried to protect Mr Carroll, but the second man "lashed out" and kicked him in the chest. She was knocked to the ground by a blow and said she then saw Mr Roche kicking Mr Carroll in the stomach. She went over to the injured man and said he was breathing "pure heavy" and trying to talk to her, but she couldn’t understand him.

She said he needed to go to hospital and the accused man pulled her away and said he would take him but the second man refused to give him the keys to the car. Mr Roche carried Mr Carroll back into her sister’s house and put him on the couch.

"He was looking for a pen and paper," she said. "We gave him a crayon - but he couldn’t write. He did the 999 sign on the couch," she told counsel.

After a while, she said the accused and two others put the injured man into a car and told her they were taking him to the hospital.

"I thought it was only a row, I thought he was going to be ok," she said. The next day the accused and the two others claimed that Mr Carroll had jumped out of the car and ran away.

"William Roche said he’d tried to catch up with him, but that he couldn’t, he didn’t know where he went," she said.

"It was lies ... John was in no state to run anywhere," she said.

The prosecution allege that Mr Carroll was brought in a semi-conscious condition by Mr Roche and two others to a remote laneway where his head was "bashed in" with the handle of a hatchet.

He was left for dead and no assistance was called, it is alleged. The trial continues before Mr Justice Kevin O’Higgins and a jury.