The jury in the trial of a woman accused of murdering two men over a decade ago has been sent away until Thursday, having been told a significant witness “is in a medical situation” and that all sides will need to consider whether the trial can continue in their absence.
Ruth Lawrence (45), who is originally from Clontarf in Dublin but with an address at Patricks Cottage, Ross, Mountnugent in Co Meath has pleaded not guilty to murdering Anthony Keegan (33) and Eoin O’Connor (32) at an unknown location within the State on a date between April 22nd, 2014 and May 26th, 2014.Their bodies were recovered on May 26th on Inchicup Island in Lough Sheelin.
Addressing the 12 jurors on Tuesday morning, trial judge Mr Justice Tony Hunt said that late yesterday it came to the prosecution’s attention that a key witness – who is “significant to both sides in the case” – “is in a medical situation”. “That’s really all that needs to be said. We don’t have full details of that and it has to be ascertained,” he said.
He said, “the unforeseen and unforeseeable happens in everyone’s lives” and that he didn’t want to go into too much detail.
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“When the details are ascertained, the parties will need to consider the information and how it bears on the availability of the witness and whether the trial can continue in their absence. There are a number of moving parts to all that,” continued the judge.
Mr Justice Hunt told the jury of four men and eight women that he may bring them in Wednesday morning but expected further information to be forthcoming.
The judge told the panel that he and the legal teams would come to court tomorrow in their absence and that he would bring them back on Thursday morning, when he had further information for them.
In his opening address, Michael O’Higgins SC, prosecuting, told the jury the State would argue that Ms Lawrence shot drug dealer Mr O’Connor and worked “as a unit” with her boyfriend to kill him and another man, with their bodies later found “bound in rope, tape and covered in tarpaulin” by fishermen on Inchicup Island on May 26th, 2014.
The jurors were also told by Mr O’Higgins it is the prosecution’s case that the accused woman and her boyfriend had “spoken openly” about “the murders and disposing of the bodies”.
