Two witnesses claim they were shot in gun attack

Two Dublin men have given evidence of being shot in a gun attack in their friend’s driveway in which that friend was killed.

Paul Core and Anthony Harte were testifying at the Central Criminal Court on the second day of the murder trial of David Patchell.

The 21-year-old of Rossfield Crescent, Tallaght has pleaded not guilty to murdering 20-year-old Stephen O’Halloran on January 19, 2009 at Kilmartin Drive, Tallaght.

He has also pleaded not guilty to attempting to murder Mr Core and Mr Harte and to causing them serious harm on the same occasion.

Mr Core said he had known the deceased all his life. That evening, they drank beer and smoked cannabis with Mr Harte in Mr O’Halloran’s car, parked in Mr Harte’s driveway.

Mr O’Halloran left the car to relieve himself and spoke to people in a black Nissan Micra. Mr O’Halloran received a phone call after returning to his car and later drove the three of them to his own house.

Mr O’Halloran first drove into his driveway, but then turned around and reversed in. He (Mr Core) was in the passenger seat and Mr Harte was in the back.

He said they sat there for a while and Mr O’Halloran received another call.

“He said someone was on his way over for a few sniffs, a few sniffs of cocaine,” he explained. He said that Mr O’Halloran had no cocaine so he was expecting the person coming to bring it.

He said that the shooting started 20 minutes later.

“We were sitting there and I heard all the bangs, a good few, five or six,” he recalled. “I seen flashes. I just ducked down into the seat and turned to the left, to the window. I had my hand like that (over his head) to shield myself.”

Mr Core was hit in the arm and back, but felt only the arm injury.

“I just played dead in the car,” he recalled. “It happened so fast.”

He said that when the shooting stopped, he ran into Mr O’Halloran’s house and was rushed to hospital.

He stood up in the witness box and pointed to where a bullet entered and exited his arm as well as to where a second bullet entered his back. This bullet is still lodged in his back.

“They said it’s safer to leave it there,” he said, referring to the doctors who treated him.

Mr Core, who was 21 at the time, agreed with Brendan Grehan SC, defending, that the shots came through the front window of the car and that he didn’t see the gunman.

He also agreed that Mr O’Halloran “had a few enemies”.

“I didn’t think anyone would go off and shoot him,” he said.

Mr Harte, who was 26 at the time, said he had spent every day for the p not known him well before that and had met Mr Core only a couple of times.

He also noticed the way Mr O’Halloran had first driven into his driveway but then turned the car around.

“We were just sitting there chatting away, laughing and joking when I saw a flash and heard a bang,” he recalled. “Then a load more bangs.”

Mr Harte didn’t realise he had been hit at first.

“I blanked out I’d say for about 10 seconds,” he explained. “I woke up real fast. I said I think I’m hit because I felt something running down my chest.”

He too jumped out of the car and ran into Mr O’Halloran’s house and was rushed to hospital.

He was also hit by two bullets, one to his arm and one to his chest. The bullet in his chest was removed last summer as it was touching a nerve.

Mr O’Halloran’s father, Nicholas Dunne, said the deceased was the eldest of his five children.

He said he was in bed that night when he heard something outside.

“I looked out the window and saw Stephen’s car and two men standing over the car, either side at the passenger and driver‘s doors,” he recalled.

He realised they were shooting at the car.

“They ran off down the road,” he said.

The jury was later shown two Glock pistols found in a front garden in a neighbouring estate. Garda Stephen Murray identified the handguns he found behind a wall in Kilmartin Gardens the following day.

The trial continues before Mr Justice Barry White and a jury of seven women and five men.