Kerryman told gardaí he plotted to kill uncle, court told

A Kerryman on trial for murdering his uncle told gardaí he and his father planned to kill the 69 year-old bachelor and dispose of his body in a well.

At the Central Criminal Court today Inspector Michael Donovan told a murder trial jury that Eugene Daly, aged 29, contacted him on February 9, 2003 and said he “wanted to clear up a few things” about his uncle’s death.

He was giving evidence on the tenth day of the trial of Eugene Daly, of Dooneen, Kilcummin, Killarney who has pleaded not guilty to the murder of his uncle, Mr Patrick (Paddy) Daly at Dooneen on January 18, 1996.

The jury has already heard that Eugene Daly told gardaí that his father Sean, who is now deceased, hit his uncle Patrick (Paddy) Daly with an iron bar after the two of them had gone to his uncle's house to sort out "bad blood that started thirty years ago".

When Inspector Donovan met the accused on February 9, Mr Daly told him that he had killed his uncle Paddy’s dog and tried “to scare him” by painting slogans on the walls of his home, before finally plotting with his father to kill him.

“Dad and I thought about his a good while back. We’d have a better time and more money if Paddy wasn’t around,” he said.

“In the car we decided to get Paddy on his own and do a job on him,” he said. “We had discussed where we’d get rid of it…we’d worked it out that we’d end Paddy and we did”.

“We thought who would blame his brother and nephew?” he continued.

The accused said his uncle had threatened to take him and his father to court and called them a “bad lot” after speculating that Daly and his father were responsible for killing his dog.

“He kept on fighting about money and things,” he said. On the day he was killed Mr Daly and his father confronted Paddy in his kitchen.

“It started in the kitchen, after a while Paddy got hit by Dad with a bar, a long brown bar, about four feet long,” he said.

“He was trying to get away from us, we were angry, we were terrible looking,” he continued.

“Paddy was afraid of us, he fell and Dad hit him a few more times on the top of the head. I had steel-toe-capped boots on, I was kicking him in the ribs and chest, I was kicking him to do Dad a favour,” he continued.

“I just kicked him for a sick kind of thrill,” he added.

The accused said “it felt good to hit back, like the bad guys” and said his father told him the well would be the best place to dispose of his uncle’s body because it was deep.

“It felt great to get rid of Paddy…I threw Paddy in the well head- first,” he said. Afterwards, he cleaned up the scene and washed blood from the iron bar, which he also disposed of.

He also told gardaí that some time in early January he had broken up stones, which he intended to use to fill up the well after the incident.

“I didn’t think we’d get away with it, coz no-one gets away with that sort of stuff.” “It’s better this way to tell the truth, it was a melodrama,” he added.

The trial continues tomorrow before Mr Justice Henry Abbott and a jury.