Father of murder accused arrested within an hour of incident, court told

The father of a man on trial for murder was arrested on suspicion of involvement in the crime within an hour of the killing taking place, it was revealed today.

The detail emerged on day five of the Dublin murder trial at the Central Criminal Court, where a 31-year-old inner city man is charged with murdering another Dublin man on April 6, 2007.

Michael Taylor of Summerhill has pleaded not guilty to murdering Paul Kelly at Winston Ville apartments on Charlemont Road in Clontarf.

The 26-year-old from O’Brien Hall in the inner city died almost instantly when he was shot several times around 11.45pm that night.

Detective Sergeant David Gallagher testified today that he was at the murder scene at 12.20am on April 7 when he got a call to Innisfallen Road in Drumcondra, where a colleague had stopped a black Saab.

“I arrested Michael Taylor Snr on suspicion of unlawful possession of firearms at Winston Ville apartments,” he said, referring to the defendant’s father.

He said that he was later part of a team that searched a house in Rutland Court in the city. There he arrested a second man, Thomas Fox, also on suspicion of unlawful possession of firearms at Winston Ville apartments.

He identified for the jury two mobile phones seized from the men that morning.

Detective Inspector Paul Scott had already told the jury that there were four people in the house on Rutland Court when it was searched. He said he seized a number of mobile phones from the house.

The jury previously heard that a phone attributed to the defendant was using a mobile phone mast near the crime scene around the time of the murder.

Earlier in the trial, the court heard that Mr Kelly died of catastrophic injuries to a number of organs due to multiple gunshot wounds.

The trial continues before Mr Justice Barry White and a jury of nine men and three women.