A life sentence is a long time to think for convicted murderer Nicholescu

Family struggle to highlight the human behind the horror story in one of the longest and most gruesome murder cases in Cork history, writes Liam Heylin 

The family and friends of Frankie Dunne were dignified and made a heroic attempt to have him remembered in loving terms. 

An unusual phrase — constructed in English by the Romanian accused of murdering a Cork man — proved more telling than he probably intended. The particular phrase was used in a phone call from Bucharest to Cork on a day soon after Frankie Dunne’s gruesome killing.

Ionut Cosmin Nichoclescu was under pressure and left Cork in a hurry three days after the murder. He jumped on a bus to Belfast, flew to Edinburgh, and on to Bucharest. Vincent O’Sullivan — then detective inspector — managed to have several phone conversations with him over those days. The detective told him up front that the conversations were being recorded. And those recordings were played in court — the only time we got to hear Nicholescu, as he never got into the witness box in his trial.