Man arrested for murder of Ashling Murphy immediately after being discharged from hospital, court told

A man was arrested for the murder of Ashling Murphy immediately after being discharged from hospital and was charged the following night with her murder, a jury has been told.

Det Garda David Scahill said he arrested Jozef Puska at St James’s Hospital in Dublin on the morning of January 18th 2022 and took him to Tullamore Garda station where he was detained under section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act and interviewed.

After his formal release the following evening following two authorised extensions of his detention, Mr Puska was immediately rearrested, charged with the murder of Ms Murphy and cautioned to which he replied: “No”, he said.

Garda Ciara Martin said Mr Puska had constant access to a solicitor during his detention at Tullamore station on January 18th into January 19th 2022 and a doctor certified he was fit for questioning.

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When Michael Bowman SC, for Mr Puska, asked whether she had gone outside for the station for “a cup of tea, a biscuit”, Mr Justice Tony Hunt interrupted and said this trial was “about what happened in the ditch”.

The judge asked counsel what his question had to do with that. Counsel said he was seeking to establish if the witness was aware whether a crowed ad gathered outside the station when Mr Puska arrived there on the morning of January 18th.

Garda Martin said she was unaware whether people had gathered outside.

She was giving evidence on Friday in the continuing trial of Mr Puska (33), of Lynally Grove, Mucklagh, Co Offaly.

A native of Slovakia living here 12 years, Mr Puska has, through an interpreter, pleaded not guilty to the murder of Ms Murphy (23), at Cappincur, Tullamore, on January 12th 2022.

The jury has heard Ms Murphy died as a result of 11 stab wounds to her neck.

Mr Puska, the jury also heard, was admitted to St James’s Hospital on January 13th 2022, having said he was stabbed in the stomach in Blanchardstown the previous day, and remained there until he was discharged on January 18th.

At the close of evidence on Friday, Mr Justice Hunt told the jury the prosecution case may take another day or two.

In evidence earlier, a forensic scientist, Dr Lorna Reynolds said a male DNA profile obtained from material taken from under the fingernails of Ms Murphy matched two other profiles of Mr Puska, one developed from a blood sample of his and the second from swabs taken from him in custody.

The likelihood of the profile matching someone other than Mr Puska was one in 14,000, Dr Flanagan, who works in the DNA section of the Forensic Science Ireland laboratory, said.

She would not expect DNA to transfer from under a fingernail without there being “more than social contact”, she said. Her conclusions were reached after she had carried out male specific DNA profiling, known as YSDR profiling, in the case, she said.

The calculations made in the Irish laboratory would be considered “conservative” by some European standards, she said. The databases from which those calculations were drawn included males from ethnic groups across Europe, she added.

In his evidence, Det Superintendent Patrick O’Callaghan, from the Laois-Offaly Garda division, told Anne Marie Lawlor SC, for the DPP, that every inquiry undertaken in an investigation would form a job in a jobs book. There were over 720 jobs in the course of the investigation into the killing of Ms Murphy and each would have involved an inquiry, he said.

He agreed another man was arrested on January 12th in connection with the investigation and said he was released without charge at 10.30pm that night. That was one line of inquiry and it became apparent he was not involved in the murder of Ms Murphy, he said.

Another person of interest or suspect had entered the frame, Mr Puska, he said.

Ms Lawlor said Mr Puska had told Det Garda Fergus Hogan on January 14th that he had “cut” a girl and she asked the witness about awareness of how Ms Murphy had died.

Supt O’Callaghan said he was personally aware of Ms Murphy’s cause of death but the Garda investigation team had decided not to release that information and, to his knowledge, that information was not in the public domain.

Under cross-examination, he said he was not aware what material was circulating on social media in relation to Ms Murphy’s death.

When Mr Bowman said the other man arrested was asked about knives which indicated such information was “out there”, the witness said gardaí did not learn of the cause of death until they were informed by the pathologist at 5pm on January 13th.

Mr Bowman said witnesses at the scene had referred to seeing wounds on Ms Murphy’s neck.

The witness agreed the basis of the other man’s arrest included he was a foreign national who appeared to match a witness’s description. He agreed that man had previously had “a difficulty” with a woman in Tullamore and had followed her around.

The trial resumes on Tuesday before Mr Justice Hunt and a jury of nine men and three women.