The man accused of murdering a young Albanian woman in Sligo last year had been going out with a member of her extended family in Albania, a court heard.
A sister of the dead woman told the Central Criminal Court in Sligo yesterday that she had met the accused several times. He had been going out with her husband's sister in Albania.
Through an interpreter, Ms Shrepsa Hyseni said she first met the man accused of killing her sister in August 2002. He was the boyfriend of her sister-in-law.
She was giving evidence at the trial of Mr Eduart (Ardi) Kulici (24), Maltings Apartments, Bonham Street, Dublin, who is accused of murdering Ms Lindita Kukaj (23) on February 22nd, 2003, at her home on Wolfe Tone Street, Sligo.
The dead woman's mother, Ms Nexhmije Plorishti, said she had travelled from Albania with her eldest daughter last March to the morgue at Sligo General Hospital, where Shrepsa formally identified Lindita's body.
Ms Plorishti said detectives had shown her two photo montages and she had identified Mr Kulici in one of them. Asked to confirm if he was in court, Ms Plorishti pointed across the courtroom at the accused.
The dead woman's sister said that while the family had been reared as Muslims, Lindita had converted to Catholicism at the age of 10. Asked whether this had caused a problem in the family. she said no.
Pathologist Dr Declan Gilsenan told the jury of seven men and five women that Lindita had died of asphyxia due to manual strangulation.
Garda Fergus O'Brien said that on the morning of February 22nd, 2003, he went to the murder scene with Mr Bashkim Osaj, who pointed out the house on Wolfe Tone Street. Garda O'Brien said Mr Osaj had taken gardaí to 10 or 11 locations around Sligo which he and the accused had visited with Lindita the previous day.
The court heard it was Mr Osaj who found the knife which he says the accused threw out of the car window along with a crowbar on the Dublin/Sligo road as the two drove towards Dublin the morning after the murder. The trial continues today.
