Brothers in court in connection belfast murder

Two unemployed brothers appeared in court today charged in connection with the murder in Belfast of a man brutally beaten while on his way to work in the kitchens of an Army base.

East Belfast man David Cupples, 25, died on Christmas Day from head injuries he received three days before while walking towards the Girdwood Army Barracks in the north of the city where he worked as a kitchen porter.

William Alan Hill, 20, of Southport Court, Belfast, appeared in Belfast Magistrates’ Court charged with murdering Mr Cupples.

His younger brother Edward, 18, appeared beside him charged with attempting to dispose of clothing with intent to impede his brother’s apprehension, knowing or believing he was guilty of the murder.

Both men were remanded in custody for a month.

Police witnesses said that when the brothers were charged yesterday both replied ‘No’.

Mr Cupples, from the Braniel Estate, east Belfast, was attacked close to the Army base as he walked through Clifton Park Avenue early on a Sunday morning.

As a security precaution he had refused to allow his father to drive him directly to the Army base, but had him drop him off a few hundred yards away outside the Mater Hospital on the Crumlin Road.

Minutes after he left his father Mr Cupples was found lying in Clifton Park Avenue suffering from extensive head injuries.

Two men have already appeared in court charged with trying to dispose of video evidence in a bid to impede the apprehension of Mr Cupples’ attacker.

Last Friday one of them, postal worker Brian Dickson, 20, from Belfast failed in a bid to win bail in Belfast High Court