Gardaí investigating the killing of a 27-year-old father of a seven- month-old baby on the northside of Cork city questioned a 25-year-old man throughout the day after he was arrested yesterday morning.
Detectives arrested the man at 7.45am yesterday for questioning about the killing of Peter Lynch, of Upper John Street, who died at Cork University Hospital after being stabbed during a row at his family home at Fairfield Square in Farranree, Cork.
It is understood Mr Lynch arrived at the house at about 2am yesterday to discover a party was going on and he became involved in a row with another man which spilled out into the back garden where he was stabbed a number of times.
According to informed sources, Mr Lynch suffered a number of stab wounds to the upper body including his back. He was rushed by ambulance to Cork University Hospital but died a short time later from his injuries.
It is understood gardaí had been called to the scene by several concerned neighbours and when they arrived they found the injured man.
They immediately cordoned off the house and back garden to preserve the scene for technical examination.
Gardaí also began a series of searches and it is understood that they later recovered a knife in the garden of a neighbouring house which they believe was used in the killing and thrown over a wall. This has been sent for forensic analysis.
Gardaí under Supt Martin Shanahan of Mayfield Garda station requested the services of the Garda Technical Bureau from Dublin and the State Pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy.
Forensic experts from the Garda Technical Bureau began an examination of the scene early yesterday afternoon while Dr Cassidy arrived later and carried out a postmortem examination of the deceased at the hospital which confirmed he died from stab wounds.
Meanwhile, gardaí arrested a man on Cork's northside at around 7.45am under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act. They then brought him to Mayfield Garda station for questioning about the death.
The man was initially held for a period of six hours but this was later extended for a further six hours by Supt Shanahan to allow gardaí to continue questioning him.
Supt Shanahan had given a press briefing yesterday morning in which he said that gardaí were treating the death as a very serious incident but that he expected it to move to "a higher level" when the full results of the postmortem examination became available.
It is the second violent death in Cork city in the space of five days and follows the unrelated killing of 21-year-old Jessica Prendergast from Dublin Hill in a house on the Old Commons Road in Blackpool early last Saturday morning.