THE FORMER girlfriend of a Sligo man accused of murdering Melissa Mahon has told a jury that she had been told that Melissa was pregnant by him and that he had a plan to kill her rather than go to prison.
Angelique Sheridan told the Central Criminal Court that she had been seeing Ronald Dunbar for five or six weeks at about the time that Melissa (14) went missing. She told the court that one of Mr Dunbar’s daughters “told me Melissa was with Ronnie. She told me that Melissa was pregnant to Ronnie.”
Ms Sheridan said another time, and in the presence of another of his daughters, he said he would not go to prison for Melissa. “He said he would kill her, strangle her, he had it planned.”
Mr Dunbar (also known as Ronald McManus) (44), Rathbraughan Park, Sligo, has pleaded not guilty to murdering the schoolgirl between September 14th- 30th, 2006. He also denies threatening to kill one of his daughters during the same period.
The jury earlier heard that Melissa lived with her family in the same estate as Mr Dunbar and had become close to his daughters. She spent increasing amounts of time in the Dunbar house and went missing from her own home in August 2006.
She was taken into care at the end of that August and placed in a residential facility but continued to leave to spend time with Mr Dunbar. She was last seen by her social worker on September 14th. Her body was discovered in February 2008 at the shore of Lough Gill.
Ms Sheridan told Seán Gillane, prosecuting, that Mr Dunbar told her about a young girl, Melissa, who was being abused by her father and beaten by her mother and who wanted him to protect her.
During the time that Melissa was missing from her family home, Ms Sheridan heard Mr Dunbar on the phone to gardaí saying that he did not know where she was when Ms Sheridan knew that Melissa was in his house.
She said Melissa, Mr Dunbar and his daughters stayed in her house one night and before they went to bed, she spoke to the girls in his absence.
“Melissa told me she was Cleopatra reincarnated and Ronnie was a reincarnated lord or husband. They were going to move to the highlands or the new world and when they died they would be burned on a boat together.”
Ms Sheridan said Mr Dunbar’s daughter then told her that she could see ghosts and demons but her father could fight them and catch them in the tattoos on his arms. When she spoke to Mr Dunbar about this, he told her anything was possible and everyone had their beliefs.
She said Melissa said she used to love him but now she loved him like a father. Ms Sheridan said he admitted Melissa had previously been infatuated with him and that he had barred her from his house for that reason.
Ms Sheridan told Mr Gillane that another time, Mr Dunbar was in her flat and he received a phone call. She heard a female shouting and he said “I’m coming, I’m coming,” and left.
When he returned he said Melissa had been in some distress and was making strange noises. “He said there was something inside her and he took it out. He said it was an exorcism”.
He came to her flat again with his eldest daughter, Shirley, and Ms Sheridan asked what was happening to Melissa. “Shirley said something about prison and he said he wouldn’t go to prison for her, he’d kill her, strangle her, he had it planned”.
Under cross-examination by Brendan Grehan SC, defending, Ms Sheridan said that Mr Dunbar had told her that he had been in the witness protection programme after giving evidence against drug dealers in Britain and that he and Shirley had been shot. She said he had been in Scotland but had to get away as he was under threat and was being called a pervert.
Mr Grehan suggested to her that she did not tell gardaí that Mr Dunbar had said he had a plan to kill Melissa until she made a statement in April 2008, after he had been arrested and charged.
Ms Sheridan said she had spoken to a garda in confidence and expressed her concern for the girl in September 2006. She could not believe what she had heard and she was frightened of him. She knew something was terribly wrong but didn’t know what to do.
When pressed as to why she did not go to gardaí when Melissa was missing from the care facility, Ms Sheridan said she was not missing, “she was with Ronnie. I didn’t know she was in care. His daughter told me Melissa was with Ronnie. She told me that Melissa was pregnant to Ronnie.”
Mr Grehan said: “You’ve given very dramatic evidence about a plan to kill Melissa Mahon by strangling her rather than go to prison and now you say that his daughter said that Melissa was three months pregnant”.
Garda Pat Conway told the court that he had been closely involved with dealing with Melissa’s disappearances in August and September 2006. He knew Mr Dunbar “of old” and he had agreed to help in the search for Melissa before she was taken into care in August “He said he’d send out feelers through Travellers and others.”
The trial is expected to continue for another four weeks before Mr Justice Barry White and a jury.