BRIAN KEARNEY has lodged an appeal against his conviction for the murder of his wife at their home in south Dublin two years ago.
Kearney (51), an electrical contractor, was found guilty at the Central Criminal Court earlier this month of murdering his wife Siobhán (38) at Knocknashee, Goatstown, on February 28th, 2006, his 49th birthday.
After a 13-day trial, the jury of eight women and four men took five hours and 24 minutes to reach their verdict by a majority of 11 to one. He was given the mandatory life sentence.
The prosecution had argued that Kearney strangled his wife and then tried to fake a suicide by hoisting her over a bathroom door with a vacuum cleaner flex. The motive, it said, was that Ms Kearney's plan to leave her husband would add to his financial pressures.
Her body was found by her father, Owen McLaughlin, who forced in her locked bedroom door after seeing some ruffled bedclothes through the keyhole and hearing no response from his daughter.
The couple's three-year-old son was alone in the house when Ms Kearney's body was found.
In her evidence, State Pathologist Prof Marie Cassidy said she believed Ms Kearney died due to ligature strangulation from compression of the neck. Her injuries were consistent with a significant force being applied to her neck and maintained for enough time to cause death by asphyxia.
One hypothesis was that she could have been assaulted in the bed and gripped around the neck and rendered unconscious, at which point a ligature could have been wrapped around her neck, accelerating her death, she said.
A Courts Service spokesman said solicitors for Kearney lodged notice of appeal with the office of the Court of Criminal Appeal over the Easter period. However, the grounds for appeal were not specified. Due to a backlog of cases, it is not expected to come before the court for at least six months.
