Meg Walsh was in river for several days, court hears
A Waterford woman whose husband is currently on trial for her murder was in the water for at least “several days” before her body was pulled from the River Suir, a Central Criminal Court jury has heard.
Professor Marie Cassidy told prosecuting counsel Mr Dominic McGinn BL that all the indicators suggested that Meg Walsh had been in the water for at least seven days and was entirely consistent with her being in the water for the length of her disappearance.
Bus driver John O’Brien (aged 41) with an address in Ballinakill Downs, Co Waterford denies murdering the 35-year-old mother of one on a date between October 1 and October 15, 2006.
Her body was found floating face down in the River Suir, naked, with a heavy metal chain around her neck. Her long blonde hair was matted with seaweed, several of her cosmetic nails were cracked and split and she was covered in a film of mud.
She had two complex skull fractures that resembled an indented jigsaw puzzle. She agreed with Mr McGinn that the injury would have been caused like “hitting a boiled egg”.
She also had bruising across her right shoulder and arm, across the left hand, which had two broken fingers, and bruising to the abdomen.
Prof. Cassidy said it was impossible to tell for sure whether Ms Walsh had been dead when she was put in the water but it was more likely that she had died quickly due to the amount of blood found in her skull.
She said that the skull fractures would have been caused by at least two blows from a heavy blunt object, which could have been a crook lock, mentioned already in the trial.
The injuries to her shoulder, arms and left hand would have been defensive although the injuries to her right shoulder and arm had been inflicted several hours before death, possibly as long as 24 hours.
She said that even if she had not died immediately, the skull fractures would have been fatal.
The jury also heard from Inspector John Hunt who told prosecuting counsel Mr Denis Vaughan Buckley SC that Mr O’Brien told him he had assaulted his wife on September 20.
He said Mr O’Brien told him the couple had started fighting during a meal out with his parents. She called him a “fat b***ard” and he called her a “fat b***h”.
He said, when they got home Meg started shouting again. He said he was going to bed and she grabbed him. When he pulled her hand away she started screaming, he said.
“I lost it. I hit her on the head and the back of the head with my fist and told her to stop screaming.”
He said she ran into the kitchen and opened the window. He pulled her away from the window, breaking her bracelet. He said she had “a bad bruise on the arm”.
Mr O’Brien said he caught her by the shoulders and her body and pulled her towards the table. When they sat at the table she calmed down.
Ins. Hunt said Mr O’Brien told him he had previously been married but was separated in 1998. The marriage lasted for three years and the couple had no children.
He told gardaí he met Meg Walsh on holiday in Crete in 2000. She was staying at the same resort with her first husband, Colman Keating.
He said she had married Mr Keating when she was 18 or 19 and had possibly been pregnant with her daughter Sasha at the time. He got to know both Meg and her husband.
Mr O’Brien said when Mr Keating went to bed early after watching a European Championship match, Meg convinced him to go into town to a nightclub with her. The affair started soon after, while they were still on holiday.
It continued when the two couple’s returned home. Meg would travel from Fermoy almost every weekend. She would spend Saturday night with him and travel back home on Sunday night.
In November 2000 he received a call from Colman Keating who had found his number on her phone. Meg moved up to Waterford in February 2001. They were married on October 22, 2005.
Mr O’Brien told gardaí that Meg would spend a lot of money. She persuaded him to buy a bigger house with her and ran up substantial debts. Mr O’Brien said when his SSIA matured in May 2006 he gave her a cheque for €10,000 and €2,000 in cash.
At the time she owed at total of around €50,000. She had €18,000 on one credit card and a further six or seven thousand on a second.
He told gardaí he had also recently discovered that she had taken out a loan for a further €24,000 he had not known about, which she was paying back at €150 a week.
He said he had recently signed a form which signed over the title deeds of the house to Meg. He said he had also loaned Meg an extra €11,000 because the bank would not allow her to take over the house unless her debts were paid.
He told gardaí that after the assault she said to him: “Look, if I give you €150,000 would you go? I could buy you out and you could have enough to buy a nice house.”
He refused, saying: “I don’t want to lose you. I will make everything up to you.”
Ins. Hunt said Mr O’Brien claimed that he had gone for a drive on Sunday October 1 after arguing with his wife the previous night when he caught her kissing a mutual friend.
He said he drove his own car to Tramore and sat in it reading the Sunday papers and listening to the radio.
Ins. Hunt told Mr Buckley that Mr O’Brien had been picked up by CCTV cameras in the centre of Waterford at this time.
Ins. Hunt said when he visited the house on October 2 he noticed that the washing machine temperature had been pushed right up to 90 degrees.
The jury previously heard that a pair of beige trousers and three white shirts were found on the washing line when gardaí searched the house.
He said that Mr O’Brien said he had gone out on Monday night to look for Meg’s car, driving round friend’s houses to see if he could see it.
However, one of the cars he described seeing had not been parked outside the house that night.
Ins. Hunt said that he went out to meet Mr O’Brien at his in Ballinakill Downs after seeing Meg Walsh’s body recovered from the river.
Mr O’Brien came out to meet him and Ins. Hunt told him “he had been telling lies and he had murdered his wife”.
The trial continues on Monday before Mr Justice Barry White and the jury of seven men and five women.
