"Perfectly innocent explanation" for fingerprints, court told

There could be a "perfectly innocent explanation" for the presence of fingerprints of a man accused of double murder on the glasses of one of the victims, a defence lawyer has told a jury.

Mr Blaise O'Carroll SC was finishing his closing speech on behalf of the accused, Mr Yu Jie, on the 56th day of the Central Criminal Court trial.

Yu Jie (aged 25), with a last address at McKee Avenue, Finglas, Dublin has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Ms Liu Qing (aged 19) in an apartment at Blackhall Square, off North King St., Dublin 7, between 6pm on March 12, 2001 and 3am on March 14, 2001.

He also denies the murder of Ms Liu's boyfriend, Mr Yue Feng (aged 19) between 1pm on March 12 and 3am on March 14 in the same place.

The burnt remains of the deceased couple were found on the bed of their rented apartment after a fire explosion shortly before 1am on the morning of March 14, 2001.

Scenes of crime examiners found a pair of black glasses under a table in the kitchen-dining room.

There was evidence before the jury that the male deceased, Yue Feng, had bought the glasses during a visit to China just prior to his death.

The glasses were damaged when they were found and fingerprint officers found a thumbprint matching that of the accused man on the left lens of the spectacles. Fingerprints matching the accused were found on other items in the apartment.

In his closing speech, Mr Blaise O'Carroll SC, for Yu Jie, told the jury that there could be an innocent explanation

"You can see that the Chinese are a touchy-feely people", he told the jury.

"And you can see a situation where Yue Feng comes back from China with his new glasses and shows them to his friend, Yu Jie, and Yu Jie takes them in his hands and has a look at them".

That would be "a perfectly innocent explanation" for the presence of the thumbprint on the lens, he said.

The defence counsel suggested that his client had found himself in "a surreal, Kafkaesque world" when he was being interrogated in the Bridewell garda station in late March 2001.

Mr O'Carroll said that Yu Jie, who had complained of a headache in the course of one interview with gardai, had his complaint ignored by his translator, who was not only acting as "the secret policeman" but was making "critical decisions" about what he was translating and passing on to gardai.

The jury has heard that a third assistant commissioner of the Chinese police, who is also a qualified medical doctor and forensic pathologist, Mr Zhijin Zuo, acted as a translator during custody interviews after being approached by the Garda when he was seconded to Interpol to work as a disaster victim identification expert in Lyon, France.

The jury has been played recordings of the interrogations. Most were video-taped, the remainder were on audio tape.

The defence counsel focused on the failure of Mr Zhijin to pass on to gardai Yu Jie's remark during one of the interviews that he had a headache and felt he was suffocating.

Mr O'Carroll alleged that the accused man's constitutional right to silence had been effectively "blown away" by persistent questioning. He suggested that his client had found himself in a situation where he was told he had a right to silence, but the gardai kept on putting questions to him, and when he said he had a headache, this was simply ignored and the questioning continued.

Mr O'Carroll said that the gardai were "ably assisted by the Sheriff of Beijing", Mr Zhijin, whom he alleged had "actively participated as a police officer" in the interviews, rather than acting merely as an interpreter.

"This was the Kafkaesque situation in which Yu Jie found himself", said Mr O'Carroll.

The judge's charge to the jury of six women and five men begins tomorrow.