Harbison absence 'creates no difficulty' for trial, court told
The unavailability of the former State Pathologist Professor John Harbison will not create any difficulties in the trial of a man accused of murdering his wife 10 years ago, the Central Criminal Court was told.
Prof Harbison, who has been ill for several months, was due to give evidence at the trial of 65-year-old John Diver, Kilnamanagh Road, Walkinstown, Dublin, who denies murdering his wife Geraldine (aged 42) at Robinhood Road, Clondalkin on December 2 1996.
At the Central Criminal Court today, counsel for the prosecution Mr Edward Comyn SC said the Professor had carried out an autopsy on the dead woman in December 1996.
As the professor was unable to attend court in person, his report into the cause of Geraldine Diver’s death would be read out to the jury.
“It (the report) will say that Mrs Diver died as a result of asphyxia due to strangulation,” said Mr Comyn.
In response counsel for the defence Mr Brendan Grehan SC said that the fact that the professor’s absence “would not create a difficulty” and it could be put to the jury “at an appropriate time”.
At today’s opening of the trial, Mr Comyn told the jury of seven men and five women that the state will allege that Geraldine Diver “was murdered by her husband that evening”.
He stated that Diver had the opportunity to kill his wife, and it impossible that “somebody else could have done it”.
On the night in question, there was a relatively short time frame from when the victim left work, and when her body was found.
The dead woman had lived with her husband and their two children, then aged nine and 13 years of age.
On the night of December 2, 1996 Mrs Diver was found in the driver’s seat of a small car outside the gates of Buckley’s builder’s providers by a security guard doing his rounds at 10.45pm.
The engine of the car was still running.
When he opened the door of the car, he found a middle-aged woman who appeared to be dead, and had something tied around her neck.
On the night in question Mr Comyn added that evidence would also be given by a truck driver, who shortly before 10pm that evening saw Mrs Diver slumped in the front seat of her car.
The truck driver noticed that the women’s top was pulled up, and two hands from somebody in the back of the car were covering the women’s breasts.
The driver thought this was unusual and reported the incident a short time later.
Mr Comyn added that two witnesses would say that they saw Mrs Diver in her car in the evening of December 2.
One of the two knew the family, Mr Comyn added, would say that they saw Mrs Diver driving the vehicle, while the accused was in the back of the car.
Diver, a former porter at the Coombe women’s hospital, was older than his late wife whom he met while working at the hospital.
In 1995 Diver retired from his job while his wife continued to work there.
She had left work between 9.15pm and 9.20pm the night she was found dead.
Mr Comyn said that shortly before Mrs Diver’s death the couple’s marriage “was on the rocks”, and a “separation was imminent”.
She had embarked on an extra marital affair with a younger man, and on one occasion had spent a weekend away from her family.
The affair commenced after the couple had a drink together in a pub. Mr Comyn said that the relationship was sexual.
While condoms were used at first, the man, who worked in a supermarket, would say in his evidence that he and Mrs Diver “wanted to have a baby together”.
“Diver,” continued Mr Comyn was, “a man under threat, because his wife was going off with a younger man.
The trial, which is being heard by Mr Justice Philip O’Sullivan, is expected to last two weeks.
