The jury in the trial of Co Mayo farmer Pádraig Nally, who is accused of the manslaughter of John "Frog" Ward, was sent to a hotel again last night after failing to reach a verdict at the Central Criminal Court in Dublin.
The eight men and four women have now been deliberating for almost 10 hours over a two-day period. At the start of yesterday's deliberations, trial judge Mr Justice Kevin Higgins told the jury it could return a majority verdict.
Before sending them to a hotel, he told the jury, "It's been a long, hard day. You must be exhausted."
Earlier, he said they must be under no time constraints whatsoever and he would continue to be at their disposal to give any assistance in terms of the facts and the law.
Mr Nally (62), Funshinaugh Cross, Claremorris, Co Mayo, has pleaded not guilty to the manslaughter of John Ward on October 14th, 2004.
The 42-year-old victim, who was a Traveller and a father of 11, died at the scene after being shot twice and beaten with a stick. The jury will begin its deliberations again this morning.
Though smartly turned out in a pin-striped suit, shirt and tie, Mr Nally's pallor betrayed the stress and medical condition which left him in hospital over the weekend.
By 7pm yesterday in the Four Courts, his trial was already six days old. The jury's lengthy deliberations were a sharp contrast to the original trial in July 2005, when it took a Mayo jury just a couple of hours to settle on a verdict of manslaughter over murder.
Under Mr Justice O'Higgins, the jury is faced with a choice of manslaughter or acquittal, a straight choice of guilt or innocence.
Although he had instructed the jury not to decide the case on sympathy for Mr Nally or their views on Travellers or out of sympathy for the Ward family, he acknowledged this would be "a hard thing to do" because of a lot of publicity and strong feelings about the case.
Yesterday morning, once the jury had asked the judge to read some of the evidence back to it relating to the demeanour of Mr Nally just after the killing, it retired amid a general sense it would be reappearing sometime soon with a verdict. No one connected to the case risked wandering too far from the Round Hall.