Man threatened to kill Cork chef at tented village two weeks before his death, court told
James Brady (right) one of two men accused of murdering the father-of-one, said that he "loved” Mr Hourihane and “trusted him with my life”. Photo: Michael Mac Sweeney/Cork Courts
A man allegedly threatened to kill Cork chef Timmy Hourihane two weeks before he was beaten to death, the Central Criminal Court has heard.
James Brady, one of two men accused of murdering the father-of-one, said that he "loved” Mr Hourihane and “trusted him with my life”.
But other people living at the tented village off Mardyke Walk where Mr Hourihane was killed ‘had issues’ with Mr Hourihane’s sexuality because he was gay, he said. And one man who cannot be named for legal reasons threatened to kill Mr Hourihane two weeks before the fatal assault, Mr Brady said.
Mr Hourihane had been talking to Mr Brady and asked him "when he was going to come out of the closet" one day at Mardyke Walk, he said. “He was always like that,” Mr Brady said.
But the unnamed man then started shouting and said to “get his f**king hands off him or he’d kill him, he’d dig him,” Mr Brady said. The threat was serious, Mr Brady said, but it did not escalate beyond words that day.
But Mr Hourihane was impacted by the threat, he said. Mr Hourihane left the camp that same day and did not return until approximately two days before his death.
He said that although Mr Hourihane would tell him he was gorgeous and ask when he was going to come out, it was just his personality and Mr Brady never felt threatened by it. "I loved him. I could tell him anything,” he said.
"I trusted him with my life. I was in treatment with him twice. I lived another life with him when he was sober. Different to his life on the streets,” he said.
“In all the time I knew Timmy I never saw him get in an argument. He was well-known around town and well-liked. But the lads there [at Mardyke Walk] only knew him a few weeks.” He said he never complained to anyone at the camp about Mr Hourihane’s affection for him because “there was nothing to complain about”.
In an interview with gardaí after he was charged with murder, Mr Brady explained that he stayed with Mr Hourihane in his tent for some time when he first came to the ‘tented village’ off Mardyke Walk some weeks before the killing. He then got his own tent and moved into that.
On the night of his death, Mr Hourihane had come to his tent, hugged him, and said "happy birthday". “I remember telling him I was 26 years old and he said I was only a boy. He said ‘would everyone around here be as handsome as you?’ while looking at [unnamed man]. We laughed. He kept hugging me and I pushed him away.
“[Unnamed man] punched him. [Unnamed man] snapped and started roaring that he was a gay c**t.” As Mr Hourihane walked away, the unnamed man ‘gave him another slap’, Mr Brady said.
“[Unnamed man] was telling me to keep my mouth shut. [Unnamed man] left and went back to his tent. He put on new jeans and t-shirt.
“I had enough, I walked away. I did not have anything to do with the murder of Timmy Hourihane,” he said.
He said that he had no physical contact with the victim. Although the court previously heard that blood matching Mr Hourihane's DNA had been found on his right shoe and clothing. He said that he tried to help Mr Hourihane by asking someone to ring an ambulance that night.
Mr Brady, 28 of Shannon Lawn, Mayfield, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Mr Hourihane at Mardyke Walk in Cork City on October 13, 2019.
Mr Hourihane, a father-of-one was a trained chef from West Cork who was homeless at the time of his death. He suffered extensive bleeding in his lungs due to severe blunt-force head and facial trauma and died from blood inhalation with a traumatic cardiac arrest complicated by brain swelling and a lack of blood supply to the brain.
The trial in front of Ms Justice Deirdre Murphy and a jury of seven women and five men continues.
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