Witness tells trial she saw accused kicking man on night Timmy Hourihane died
Timothy Hourihane, a former chef from west Cork was homeless at the time of his death. He suffered extensive lung hemorrhaging due to blunt force, and head and facial trauma.
A woman said that she saw two men repeatedly kicking a man who was lying on the ground in the same location and on the same night as former Cork chef Timmy Hourihane was killed.
Paula O’Shea was living in a ‘tented village’ off Mardyke Walk in Cork city at the time of the alleged murder there on October 13, 2019.
She said that she was with her partner, Adrian Henry, that night. The atmosphere in the camp had been “fine” during the day but as night fell “it became increasingly tense.”
Ms O’Shea said that she first met the defendant James Brady, 28, approximately one week before the alleged fatal assault.
“He came down to the tents and was very threatening. I remember him being very aggressive and threatening. I was nervous,” Ms O’Shea told the Central Criminal Court.
She said that she next met him on October 12, 2019, some hours before Mr Hourihane died violently.
When she was sitting on a bench in the Mardyke Walk area that night, she said that she saw the defendant and another man who cannot be named for legal reasons, attacking a third man who was lying on the ground.
“I could see someone on the ground … with two individuals standing over him.
“There was a fire. I could see two silhouettes attacking someone who was on the ground.
“They were kicking the person who was on the floor.
“They kept kicking, it wasn’t stopping. They were kicking his head and abdomen.”
Ms O’Shea said that she did not know who was on the ground and she does not remember hearing shouting.
“I saw them kicking the person on the floor. I couldn’t distinguish well between them, they were silhouetted.”
She said that she couldn’t tell who was landing each blow but she remembered that they were both kicking the man on the ground.
Vincent Heneghan, defending, suggested that Ms O’Shea was wrong and had not seen his client, Mr Brady, kicking anyone that night. He said that Mr Brady, of Shannon Lawn, Mayfield, Cork city, had in fact been standing there with another witness, Kathleen O’Brien, and that he was not party to the violence.
But Ms O’Shea said: “That’s not what I remember”.
She also said that she saw a fire at the camp that night.
“One of the tents I definitely saw on fire, it was going up into the tree,” she said.
A number of people from the tented village - an unofficial camp in Cork city where people who were homeless set up tents at the time - stayed on the floor of a common room in Cork Simon that night, she said. In the morning, gardaí arrived to bring her to give a statement about the events she had witnessed the night before.
Her partner who she had been with that night, Adrian Henry, refused to give evidence before the Central Criminal Court in Waterford.
Mr Brady has pleaded not guilty to murder.
Earlier, the court heard that an Indian couple who were living in Cork when Mr Hourihane died allegedly witnessed the beginning of an attack on him that night.
Tarini Ghosh was working in UCC in 2019 and lived with his wife, Bijoylakshmi Nandi, by Mardyke Walk near where Mr Hourihane was fatally attacked on October 13 of that year.
Mr Ghosh said that when they were walking home from a party at about 12.20am that night, he saw a younger, thinner man “violently shouting at an older person,” before pushing started between them.
Giving evidence via videolink from India, Mr Ghosh said that three people, two men and one woman, were standing near a tent off Mardyke Walk in Cork city as an older, middle aged man with a plastic bag approached. He said that a “tall, lanky lad, kind of young,” seemed to be waiting for someone.
When the older man with the bag arrived, an argument broke out, he said.
The lady seemed to be trying to hold the second man, a bulkier man, who had been standing by the tent, back from the altercation, he said. “There was a tussle going on between the lady and [second] gent,” Mr Ghosh said.
"He [the younger, thinner man] was pointing fingers, saying words like ‘what have you done?’ He was accusing or threatening the older person. It was confrontational. I don’t exactly remember the bulkier man coming forward.
“I heard people shouting. We crossed over and were walking towards our apartment, I’m not sure if eventually [the bulkier man] went over to confront the older person or not.
“I heard voices of the older and younger man. I heard voices arguing with each other. It was mostly high-pitched verbal arguments that became stronger as we passed. I could see from the side them pushing each other.
“He was violently shouting at the older person, saying ‘f**k you’ or something like that. I got very scared, we were alone. We were too scared to go back.” Mr Ghoshi said that although he saw some pushing, he didn’t see anyone on the ground before the couple continued to walk home.
In a statement read by Siobhan Lankford, prosecuting, Mrs Nandi said that she had also seen the alleged altercation as she walked home that night with her husband.
“I heard a loud voice. I looked back and saw two men near a tent. They were shouting in English. I couldn’t understand what they were saying.
“Then I saw a woman. This woman was shouting. I don’t know who she was shouting at. She speaks very fast.” She said that it was too dark to give clear descriptions of the people but that she saw two men shouting “face-to-face” with the man with the plastic bag.
The trial in front of Ms Justice Deirdre Murphy and a jury of seven women and five men at a sitting of the Central Criminal Court in Waterford continues.
Mr Hourihane, a former chef from west Cork was homeless at the time of his death. He suffered extensive lung hemorrhaging due to blunt force, and head and facial trauma.
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