New age traveller murder trial suddenly adjourned

The trial of two men charged with the murder of a new age traveller in County Leitrim in 1998 has been adjourned to tomorrow for reasons the trial judge said were out of his hands.

Andrew Gordon Roche (aged 36), with an address in Drumlease, Dromohair, Co Leitrim and Keith Cooper (aged 25), with an address at Gortimar, Manorhamilton, have pleaded not guilty to the murder of Elliott Colin Double, otherwise known as Elliott Robertson, at a new age traveller campsite on the mountainside at Boihy, Co Leitrim on October 6, 1998.

On Monday, Martin Francis Barber (aged 33) of Boihy, Manorhamilton had also pleaded not guilty to the murder of Mr Robertson, but earlier today, Mr Justice Diarmuid O’Donovan told the jury that the case against him will now not proceed.

This afternoon, the judge adjourned the trial to the morning, telling the jurors it was due to matters that that were out of his hands.

The jury has heard that the three men were part of a group of new age travellers in dispute with new arrivals to their campsite. They are alleged to have knocked one man to the ground, bound his hands with a rope, and then beat him so severely that he died from his injuries. A pickaxe and a metal pole were used in the attack.

Having beaten the man, the three men allegedly then pulled him with the rope that bound his hands along a rough gravel path to a caravan, told its occupants to call an ambulance and said the injured man should consider himself lucky to be alive.

Counsel for the DPP, George Birmingham SC told the Central Criminal Court jury that the man died later in hospital.

The deceased was himself "a difficult customer" who had brandished a spade in the confrontation, counsel said, but by the time he was beaten by the three, "he was no threat to anybody".

Opening the case against Roche and Cooper, George Birmingham SC said the incident arose from a dispute between new age travellers, who had put down roots at Boihy, and casual travellers, or passers-by, who at the time had recently arrived at the site.

The settled new age travellers were concerned that the new arrivals were responsible for burglaries locally and were dumping drug syringes on the campsite.