Stabbing 'a means to an end', jury told

Lawyers for the State have told the jury in the case of a butcher on trial for murdering a shopkeeper during a robbery, that he deliberately stabbed the man through the chest as “a means to an end”.

Closing the three-day murder trial at the Central Criminal Court, Ms Una Ni Raifeartaigh SC for the prosecution, said Anthony Farrell decided to stab John Deasy so he could get him out of his way as he was trying to flee, after robbing €50 from a newsagents.

Farrell (aged 20), of Marian Villas in Arklow, has denied murdering Mr Deasy at Brauders shop in Arklow on November 25, 2009. He has pleaded guilty to robbery.

Farrell went to the newsagents at around 8pm, armed with a kitchen knife and wearing a balaclava.

“He screamed at Kay O'Connor, intimidated her with the knife, took the money and made to take off...then he came across John Deasy who is blocking his escape. Anthony Farrell made an instant decision to stab Mr Deasy as he was the one thing preventing him from getting away,” Ms Ni Raifeartaigh said.

The only thing on Farrell's mind was escape she suggested, and he “hastily but definitively” made the decision that “the only way to get out of there was to stab Mr Deasy”.

“So he plunged the knife into his chest...as a means to an end, not because he bore Mr Deasy a grudge or ill-will, but because he was getting in the way.”

Ms Ni Raifeartaigh said it was a “deliberate stabbing” and there was no question of self-defence, even though Mr Deasy had been armed with a knife himself. She said Mr Deasy “did no more than you would expect a shopkeeper to do, having had the experience of robberies in the past and having heard his employee screaming for help.”

It was clear that Farrell had used “at least moderate force”, Ms Ni Raifeartaigh said as the knife had gone in to a depth of 10cm, cutting through a rib and severing the aorta.

She asked the jury to bear in mind the fact that Farrell was “a butcher, so used to handling knives” and concluded by saying the only appropriate verdict in the case was one of murder.

Farrell's defence counsel, Mr Michael O'Higgins SC, however said that while Farrell had “done a terrible thing” the killing was not murder.

He said the prosecution had invited them to ignore that Mr Deasy had said to Farrell “this is the second f**king time and this time I have the knife.”

The court has heard that Farrell was not involved in either of the two previous armed robberies at the newsagents.

Mr O'Higgins said it was not a “leap of imagination that a 19 year old, terrified the Gardai were going to come and arrest him... was a very frightened and panicked individual. Before you factor that in, the man holding him there is armed with a knife.”

While accepting that Farrell had ran towards Mr Deasy with the knife raised, Mr O'Higgins told the jury that if they took the view Farrell had “stuck out the knife in the general direction of Mr Deasy with the intention of frightening him, but the knife was stuck in, that would be an accident, it would mean he lacked the necessary mental element for murder”.

An acquittal and murder were like two ends of a bookends Mr O'Higgins said, and the middle ground was the “manslaughter verdict, the one most appropriate for you to return”.

The jury will begin its deliberations today, after first hearing from the trial judge Mr Justice Paul Butler.