Murder accused spoke of killing deceased, court hears
A Donegal father-of-four accused of the murder of his estranged wife allegedly told his 14-year-old daughter that he was going to kill her mother, the Central Criminal Court has heard.
"He told me he was going to kill my mother, he told me he was going to stab my mother and rip her guts out," Dolores McCrea’s teenaged daughter told the court.
The second eldest daughter of the deceased, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was giving evidence in the trial of her father, Mr Gary McCrea (aged 40) of Ballybulgin, Laghy, Co Donegal. Mr McCrea denies the murder of Dolores McCrea (aged 39) of Ballintra, Co Donegal, on a date unknown between January 20 and January 22, 2004. It is alleged that Mr McCrea murdered his wife and the mother of his four children, and then burned her body.
The eldest McCrea daughter, Sharon McCrea (aged 19) told the court that there had been a custody dispute between her father and mother after they split up in 2003.
"He always maintained that mum didn’t care about any of the children, that he wanted to get full custody. He said that he was going to keep fighting in the courts for full custody, he said he’d fight and that if he didn’t get it that he’d kill her. He’d be able to do time for her, that he’d be out in no time and that he’d get his family back," she said.
Sharon McCrea told the court her mother always wore gold jewellery including three rings. She then identified a ring shown to her in court saying "that’s the same one that mum wore".
Sharon McCrea’s younger sister who cannot be named for legal reasons told prosecuting counsel, Mr Paul O’Higgins SC, that she was living with her father at the time her mother disappeared. The 15-year-old told the jury that she originally moved out with her mother after her parents split up in April 2003 and her mother initially had full custody of the four girls.
The teenager said her father used to ring her several times a day.
"He would tell me if I moved with him I would have a better life," she said.
The teenager told the court the accused said to her that her mother just wanted her "to be there to do the cleaning and the tidying up and looking after the girls," she added.
"He used to go on about other men, that she was a whore. He used to call her names, he used to say she was ‘riding’ people, that she was a tramp and a walking disease," the teenager told the court.
Dolores McCrea’s daughter, who was just 14 years old at the time, told the court she was upset about this and that she attended a psychologist.
"My father told me that I should get away from there, that I would have a better life (with him). He told me that if I stayed with my mum and sisters, a man called Willie Armstrong would become my new father," she said.
"He used to tell me that I wasn’t wanted there. I heard it so much that I believed him," the 15-year-old told the court.
She said she moved to her father’s home in Ballybulgin in August 2003.
The first few days,she told the court were "ok", but after a while "every conversation" was about her mother.
The teenager told the court her father called her mother a "tramp" and that she was allegedly having relationships with different men including Mr Willie Armstrong from Kesh in Co Fermanagh.
The teenager said her father "really" had "it in" for this man.
"He did make me believe my mum was having an affair with Willie Armstrong," she told the court.
She added that her father had allegedly talked about getting a man to "badly beat Willie Armstrong up".
"He told me he was going to kill my mother, he told me he was going to stab my mother and rip her guts out," Dolores McCrea’s 15-year-old daughter told the court.
Sgt Tony Cornyn told the court he received a phone call from the deceased’s mother, Mrs Kathleen McGrory at 5.25pm on January 20, 2004 saying that her daughter was missing.
"She’d failed to answer either of her mobile phones and had not turned up to a darts match the previous evening," Sgt Cornyn said.
Sgt Cornyn said he visited the accused’s home three times that evening. He said Mr McCrea told him that he had agreed to buy his estranged wife’s car from her for E1,000 and that she had called the previous night around 7.30pm for the money. The accused told the Sgt that Mrs McCrea had taken a lift in a "silverish or whitish car".
The next day, Sgt Cornyn said he arrived with other gardaí at the accused’s home at 8.55am to conduct a search of the roadway. Mr McCrea said he had "no objection" to the gardaí checking the sheds, the Sgt said.
"He told us to work away because he had to take the children to school", Sgt Cornyn added.
Sgt Cornyn said he saw an old iron chassis with what remained of a fire still burning behind some of the sheds. Later, the accused gave a statement to Sgt Cornyn in the kitchen of his home.
Sgt Cornyn said Mr McCrea told him that himself and Dolores had broken up and they each had joint custody of their four children.
On the night his wife disappeared he told gardaí that she had called down for the €1,000 he was to give her for her Peugot car and had left in a car which he thought was a Volkswagen Golf between 7.30 and 8pm.
The accused said he then tidied the house including taking the fire ashes outside. Mr McCrea told gardaí that he noticed that the ashes had set the bushes on fire so he went out and "doused" them.
He said he then called into Eamon Doherty’s before collecting his daughter, returning home by 11pm.
After this interview was conducted, Mr McCrea was brought outside by gardaí to look at the smouldering fire at the back of his house. Mr McCrea was informed, Sgt Cornyn said, that bones had been discovered in the smouldering fire. When asked how the bones had got there, he told gardaí "I don’t know how they got there".
Sgt Cornyn told the court that he saw two pieces of bone, the first he said was "six inches long with a ball at the end", the second piece he added was a vertebrae bone.
Sgt Cornyn told the court he asked the accused had he not doused the fire to put it out. Mr McCrea, the Sgt said told the gardaí, he had added the tyres to it the next morning as it was still burning and he wanted to burn some bushes.
The trial continues tomorrow before Mr Justice Michael Hanna.
