A man has been convicted of murder after his claim that he intended to “frighten” rather than kill a fellow resident of a Dublin hostel when he broke into his room wearing a balaclava and armed with a knife was rejected by a jury.
The Central Criminal Court heard that Robert Murphy (42) told gardaí responding to the attack on Jamie Kavanagh (24) on April 19th, 2023 that “I did him with his own weapons”. Murphy pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to Mr Kavanagh’s manslaughter, but was convicted by a jury after almost five hours of deliberations.
The jury was told that Mr Kavanagh lived in accommodation on Harrington Street operated by the Crosscare charity and that Murphy lived next door. Prosecution counsel Paul Greene said many people living on the premises were “on the margins”.
Mr Greene said gardaí arrived at the hostel at about 4.40am after the alarm was raised and Murphy was still there. He was seen leaving with a dog and an Under Armour bag and gardaí followed him down Harrington Street before stopping him.
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Murphy allowed officers to look inside the bag and they found two large knives, part of a garden shears, a balaclava, some bloodstained clothing and a mobile phone. They also found another bag containing clothing on nearby Synge Lane. Mr Kavanagh was assisted by emergency services at the hostel but died at 5.26am.
Det Garda Eve Rochfort told Mr Greene that Murphy informed her he had “done that”.
“I was actually going for his neck, I wanted to get him in the neck. I’m sick of his carry on.”
State Pathologist Dr Sally Anne Collis conducted the postmortem on Mr Kavanagh and found seven injuries from sharp objects – four stab wounds and three incisions. Dr Collis said he died due to a 13cm wound to his left flank.
Garda Matthew O’Connor told Mr Greene he was on duty at 5.10am when Murphy was brought in as a prisoner. He said he heard Murphy tell the station jailer: “I wanted to kill him stone dead. He deserved to die and somebody had to do something”.
It was the prosecution’s case that what Murphy said amounted to an admission of responsibility for the unlawful death in circumstances where he intended to cause death or serious injury.
In his closing address to the jury, defence counsel Brendan Grehan SC said Murphy entered Mr Kavanagh’s room dressed in a balaclava and armed with a butter knife in order to “frighten” but not to kill him.
He said Murphy would have armed himself with more than a butter knife, given the defendant believed Mr Kavanagh kept knives and half of a garden shears in his room, had he planned to kill him.
Murphy told gardaí the small blade he brought into the room with him broke and he picked up another knife when Mr Kavanagh “came at him”. Counsel said this small knife could not have caused the fatal blow, which was inflicted by one of Mr Kavanagh’s longer black knives. He said the prosecution had failed to prove that Murphy was not acting in what he believed was self defence.
After the jury of seven men and five women returned their verdict, Ms Justice Melanie Greally remanded Murphy in custody and adjourned the matter to December 16th for victim impact statements and sentencing.
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