A man described in court as "a moneylender and probable drug dealer" died from gunshot wounds to the chest and as many as 11 blows to the head, the State Pathologist has told the Central Criminal Court. Dr John Harbison was giving evidence yesterday on the second day of the trial of Mr Noel Kelly (19), who has pleaded not guilty to the murder of his housemate, Mr John Keane (26) at O'Malley Park, Limerick, on July 5th, 1996.
"He did not die immediately from any of these injuries but was alive to receive them all," Dr Harbison told the court. The wounds to the right side of Mr Keane's head were "extensive" and "very severe".
Assuming the metal part of a sawn-off shotgun had been used to inflict them, the force used had been "quite considerable", he said. Mr Keane's jaw was severely fractured, and there were fractures to his nose, right cheekbone and forehead.
Dr Harbison also found two shotgun entry wounds on the left back of the body, but he said these originated from one shot which passed through the arm and into the chest. There was also an entry and exit wound in Mr Keane's left hand which could have been from a third shot.
Dr Harbison postulated that Mr Keane was shot first and then beaten. Mr Keane's mother was in court yesterday to hear the evidence.
Dr Harbison said his discovery of two cartridge wads, one plastic and the other fibre, in Mr Keane's body suggested to him that two different types of ammunition had been used and also that at least two cartridges had been shot.
Earlier, gardai gave evidence of the discovery of the shotgun used in the killing in a front garden in O'Malley Park the day after Mr Keane's death.
Det Garda Thomas Carey, of the Garda Ballistics Section, told the jury that only one of three cartridges found had been discharged from this shotgun. This cartridge, he concluded, had been fired in Mr Keane's bedroom. He found bloodstains and human tissue splashed over Mr Keane's bedroom wall. The two cartridges found near Mr Keane's body were discharged from a different shotgun, he said.
The trial continues today before a jury in the Central Criminal Court after legal argument is heard by Mr Justice Morris.