Limerick man loses murder appeal

A Limerick man who murdered a Ukrainian-born teenager by stabbing him through the chest has failed in an appeal against his conviction.

In July 2010, John O’Loughlin (aged 23), with a last address at Cecil Street in Limerick city, was jailed for life by Mr Justice Paul Carney after he was unanimously found guilty by a Central Criminal Court jury of the murder of 16-year-old Roman Vysochan.

O’Loughlin had denied murdering the promising young soccer player at the Carrig Midhe estate in Limerick on May 10, 2008, but had pleaded guilty to stabbing another youth in the leg during the same altercation, for which he received a four-year concurrent sentence.

The court heard that O’Loughlin consumed a large amount of alcohol on the night in question and armed himself with a kitchen knife before confronting his victim in an upstairs bedroom in the house.

Anthony Mason (aged 19) of Bishop Street, Limerick, was jailed for five years in January 2011 for his role in the death of Roman Vysochan, after he pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter.

Roman, who had been living in Ashley Close, Westbury, Co Clare, managed to escape from the house but collapsed as he reached a main road adjacent to the Corbally estate, having suffered a 13cm chest wound.

Efforts to resuscitate him failed after he went in to cardiac arrest and he died shortly afterwards.

Returning judgement this afternoon (Monday), presiding judge Mr Justice Nial Fennelly said the appeal court would dismiss the appeal having found that O’Loughlin’s conviction was safe.

Counsel for the applicant, Mr Paul Burns SC, said that Mr Justice Carney erred in principle by failing to direct the jury adequately on the DNA evidence in the trial, while the jury were also not given an explanation as to what DNA is.

He said that, in circumstances where O’Loughlin accepted he had stabbed one victim, the expert opinion evidence of Dr Diane Daly was of the “utmost importance” in establishing whether the blood of Roman Vysochan and the other victim were on the same knife.

During the trial, Dr Daly gave evidence that she obtained a mixed DNA profile from blood found on a knife recovered from the scene, and this profile originated from either Roman Vysochan and the other victim or Roman Vysochan and an unknown individual.

Under cross-examination, Dr Daly said the likelihood of part of the mixed profile belonging to a person other than Roman Vysochan was less than one in one thousand million.

She said it was 200,000 times more likely that the mixed profile originated from Roman Vysochan and the other victim rather than Roman Vysochan and an unknown individual.

Mr Burns said that Mr Justice Carney could not “just leave it hanging there” and offer no guidance to the jury on the matter, as a trial judge had an obligation to charge a jury in respect of expert evidence given at trial.

Counsel for the State, Ms Rosemary Gearty SC, told the court that during the trial the DNA evidence was not the “fundamental point” it had been made out to be on appeal.

She told the court that it became apparent from the evidence there were only two people – John O’Loughlin and Anthony Mason – “in the frame” when it came to the stabbing and unlawful killing.

She said the DNA evidence was not of “vital importance” as the crucial evidence in the case came from a witness who stated that Anthony Mason had put down his knife upon entering the room.

Ms Gearty said she noted that when O’Loughlin was asked in interview as to whether his DNA would be found on a knife recovered at the scene, he correctly predicted it would not, showing that he, as a lay person, did not need an explanation as to what DNA was.

She said that the appeal court found itself in an “unreal” position of talking about overturning a conviction on the specifics of DNA when the science was “understood by any lay person with a television set”.

Mr Justice Fennelly said the court noted that the defence had not challenged the credentials of Dr Daly, the admissibility of her evidence, or whether she had laid sufficient grounds for giving her evidence.

He said that when Mr Justice Carney was requisitioned by the prosecution to refer to the expert opinion evidence in his charge, the defence objected on the grounds that it was not open to the judge to direct the jury on the matter in circumstances where the expert witness had not given a basis for her evidence.

Mr Justice Fennelly said that, as the defence had objected to the trial judge charging the jury on the expert evidence, it was “not easy to see” how they could now “change feet” and make a case they had not made at trial.

He said that, while it may have been “unfortunate” that a general direction was not given to the jury on the nature and function of DNA, this was a result of a particular position taken by the defence.

Mr Justice Fennelly said that there also was as a “very strong” case against O’Loughlin, which made any imperfections in the trial judge’s charge to the jury “pale into insignificance”.