Clare man cleared of murdering sister with hammer

The 21-year-old Clare man who killed his sister with a hammer has been found not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter by reason of diminished responsibility by a jury in the Central Criminal Court yesterday.

Patrick O'Dwyer, then 19, of Shrohill, Ennistymon, Co Clare, had pleaded not guilty to murdering his 17-year-old sister Marguerite at the family home on November 29, 2004.

Patrick O'Dwyer smiled as the verdict was read out and the O’Dwyer family, who sat beside him throughout the trial, all linked hands.

The jury of six women and six men took seven and a half hours to reach a verdict.

Mr Justice Paul Carney remanded Mr O’Dwyer in custody and adjourned sentencing until a later date.

This is the first time since the introduction of the Criminal Law (Insanity) Act 2006 that a person accused of murder has proved their responsibility for the killing was substantially diminished due to a mental disorder.

Before the new Act, no such defence existed, and people suffering from mental disorders were held fully responsible for their crimes.

Defence psychiatrists gave evidence that the accused suffered from a mental disorder called depersonalisation disorder.

Its symptoms included detachment or estrangement from oneself- sensory anaesthesia, lack of effective response, lack of emotional response.

Dr Cleo Van Velsen said she believed Mr O’Dwyer’s "emotional autism" and sense of" always being an external observer of himself’" led him to self-medicate with alcohol.

Dr Paul O’Connell said depersonalisation is under-recognised and is only lately becoming the subject of medical research.

The court heard how Patrick 'Pa' O'Dwyer had collapsed on two occasions during his adolescence and that his eyes "rolled" around his head.

His family members gave evidence that he often went into a "trance" while watching Aertel and that his attention was easily distracted.

His sister said he would turn his head to the side mid-conversation and mumble and that when she would ask him what he'd said, he would not know what she was talking about.

As a child, Mr O'Dwyer never cried. On one occasion, he didn't know he'd broken his arm until he realised he'd loss the use of it.

In the year leading up to the killing, Mr O'Dwyer became involved in two violent acts.

On one occasion he became aggressive with his father when he confronted him about his drunken behaviour at a wedding.

On another occasion, he punched a woman in the face and bit her fingers when she rejected his drunken attempt to kiss her.

She never pressed charges and he didn't remember his actions but when a false rumour went around the town that he'd raped her, Mr O'Dwyer tried to hang himself with a rope.

Dr Van Velsen said described said she believed Mr O’Dwyer’s mental disorder would have driven him to the attention of medics at an earlier stage were it not for the support of his family and tight-knit community.

On the day of the killing, Mr O'Dwyer went to work as usual as a butcher's apprentice.

He was still very tired from an extremely drunken night on the Saturday, when his sister had a party as their parents were on holidays.

He was deeply embarrassed because he had gotten sick and fallen and his friends had to put him to bed.

While at work he told gardaí he began "drifting" into another world.

When he got home that evening, his sister had made him Shepherd's Pie for dinner and they spoke with their parents on the phone.

Marguerite put the fire on in the living-room and they watched TV comedies together until halfway through The Office, when Mr O'Dwyer went into the kitchen and picked up a hammer.

Depressed, and overcome with feelings of profound shame and embarrassment, he planned to "bash his brains out," but when he saw Marguerite, he thought feared she would prevent him from doing so and was taken over by a feeling of being in a "movie".

He told psychiatrists "it was like watching a video" and not being able to turn it off.

As he approached her, she looked up at him and smiled. She thought he was joking, he said, as he often messed around with her with a hurley.

The six "blows" from the hammer were described by State Pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy as "fatal and irrecoverable".

The accused then went into the kitchen, picked up a scissors and a knife and stabbed his sister 90 times in the neck, trunk and legs.

After going for a walk, the accused went to his bedroom and wrote the words "Butcher Boy" on the wall with blood he drew from his arm with a scalpel.

He then hit himself four times in the head with a hammer and fell asleep until 11.30 the following morning.

When he woke, he realised the seriousness of what he'd done and once again tried to commit suicide by drowning himself in the bath.

Later that afternoon, he handed himself into gardaí.

In her evidence, his mother, Claire O'Dwyer, said she didn't know why 'Pa' killed Marguerite.

"All I know is that something awful came over him. It wasn't our Pa," she said.

She said that he and his sister were "like peas in a pod" and that he loved her.

Speaking after the verdict, his sister Louise O’Dwyer said the family were happy justice had been done.