Son told mother he had 'murdered someone', court told

The mother of one of two Dublin men accused of murdering a man said her son told her he had "murdered someone" and was going to kill himself, a jury at the Central Criminal Court heard today.

Alan Keogh, aged 32, of Wellmount Green, Finglas and Gary McNevin, aged 31, of no fixed abode but with an address at Glenhill Road, Finglas, have pleaded not guilty to the murder of Peter Mitchell of Monasterboice Road, Crumlin, at Monasterboice Road between and inclusive of October 17 and October 20, 2003.

The mother of Alan Keogh, Ms Pauline Keogh, told the court her son had come home briefly on Saturday October 18, gone upstairs and changed his clothes. "Then he went out with a plastic bag," she said.

She next saw her son on the following Monday at her home. Alan was having a conversation with his sister behind closed doors in the sitting room, the court heard.

"I said: ‘Alan, please tell me what happened’," Ms Keogh said.

"And he said: ‘I murdered someone’. I started screaming and crying, saying you wouldn’t do something like that," Ms Keogh said.

She told the jury her son "kept banging his head off the wall".

"He said he was going to kill himself," she added.

"I told him to go, go out of the house and leave me alone," Ms Keogh said.

Under cross-examination by Ms Isobel Kennedy SC, for Keogh, she told the court she had never seen her son as upset as he was that day.

The court has heard that Mr Mitchell was found dead with 16 stab wounds in his home, sitting on the couch with his feet tied.