Murder accused 'lost temper' with victim, court told
A 50-year-old man who stabbed an Aids patient to death in St James’s Hospital has told a murder trial jury he lost his temper after warning the man to stay away from young boys.
Patrick Gilraine said his intention was to “frighten” his friend Kevin Dowler when he confronted him with a knife as he lay in his hospital bed.
Mr Gilraine (otherwise known as Kilraine) of Basin St flats, Dublin 8 has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Mr Kevin Dowler (aged 52) also from Basin St flats at St James's Hospital, Dublin on February 7, 2000.
Giving his direct defence evidence at the Central Criminal Court today the accused told Mr David Goldberg SC he went to inform Mr Dowler that he’d reported him to the social workers, alleging that he had abused young boys previously and was set to harm a particular local boy once released.
“I know I’d brought a knife with me, but my intention was not to harm him, it was to frighten him,” he said. “I went round to tell him I’d reported him to the social workers, I told him and he said he was getting out tomorrow and he was going to drink himself to death and ride the child,” he said.
“I told him not to come back to Basin St, he laughed at me and told me it was none of my business,” he said.
Following this, the accused said he stabbed Mr Dowler, but only remembered two of the seven blows. “I was trying to keep him in hospital, that’s all…I was angry, I lost my temper, I meant him no harm,” he said.
When asked by his counsel why he told the gardai that he hoped his victim would die, the accused replied, “I said that in the heat of the moment, I never meant it.”
Under cross-examination by Mr Shane Murphy SC the accused denied that he’d provided the jury with a new version of events from that in his statements to the gardai. He said he hadn’t lied and should have told gardai what Mr Dowler said to him before he stabbed him.
He agreed with Mr Murphy that he had no evidence that Mr Dowler was a paedophile and that although he’d never seen what happened in Mr Dowler’s flat, he “guessed it was to do with sex”.
When asked by Mr Murphy why he never reported his concerns to the authorities or to the young boy’s parents he said, “I should have done, I done everything wrong”.
“I don’t know if it was right or wrong,” he said. “I was thinking if he harmed anyone, the diseases they’d get. I know Aids is an awful death, from what I’ve read about it,” he said.
Mr Justice Kevin O’Higgins will charge the jury tomorrow before they retire to consider the verdict.
