Garda interviews with one of the teenagers convicted of murdering Ana Kriégel were inadequate and inappropriate, the Court of Appeal has been told.
The submissions were made as part of an appeal by the teenager, publicly known as Boy B, against his conviction for the 14-year-old’s murder in Lucan, Co Dublin on May 14th, 2018.
The prosecution said it stands “100 per cent” over the interviews with Boy B, who was 13 at the time.
Boy B was convicted of Ana’s murder in 2019 after the jury accepted the prosecution’s case that he lured the girl to a derelict house where she was sexually assaulted and killed by another 13-year-old known as Boy A. He was jailed for 15 years with a review scheduled after eight years.
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The boy’s defence, led by James Dwyer SC, is attempting to introduce expert evidence on whether he was placed under undue pressure by gardaí during his five interviews.
Case law typically precludes defendants from introducing matters on appeal which were not mentioned at the original trial. At a hearing on Tuesday, Mr Dwyer told the three judge court that an exception should be made in this case on several grounds, including that the fresh expert evidence goes to the core of the prosecution case and that the evidence is of a very high quality.
Counsel said the new evidence shows that “renowned” experts believe the interviews were conducted in an “entirely inappropriate manner”. He agreed with Mr Justice George Birmingham that his application was “pretty remarkable” but said that it was a case where a murder prosecution was based entirely on the interviews of a 13-year-old boy.
[ Ana Kriégel murder trial: The complete storyOpens in new window ]
One expert commissioned by the defence, forensic psychologist Prof Susan Young, watched Boy B’s five interviews and wrote a report in December 2020 saying the interviewing was inadequate and inappropriate. Her report had several headings including the duration of the interviews, techniques used such as “manipulation and pressure”, repetition, culminative impact and ineffectual advice.
Another forensic psychologist, Prof Gisli Gudjonsson, reviewed Prof Young’s report. He concluded that the mind of Boy B was “substantially overborne” during the interviews and that the boy was unforthcoming due to “immature emotional cognitive processing” rather than maligned intentions.
Prosecuting counsel Brendan Grehan SC called it an “extraordinary application” and said no exception should be made to the rule barring the introduction of fresh evidence. He said the defence had every opportunity to raise these issues during the trial in 2019. He said he stood over the Garda interview process “100 per cent”. Boy B was an intelligent teenager with an IQ of 123 who was in control of the interviews, he said.
Gardaí used the interviews to show Boy B repeatedly lied about his movements before Ana’s death, culminating in the accused admitting he watched Boy A attack the victim in the derelict house.
[ Ana Kriegel murder: Boy A sentenced to life, Boy B sentenced to 15 yearsOpens in new window ]
Mr Grehan said every accommodation was made for the accused. This included arresting him by appointment in the Garda station, not keeping him in a cell and allowing his parents to stay at the station overnight with him. He said the interviews were of such high quality that every part of them was shown to the jury.
He added that there was never any hint from the defence during the trial that the interviews were in any way oppressive. He said it was “extraordinary” that neither professor had personally interviewed Boy B and that to his knowledge the accused still does not dispute the admissions he made to gardaí during the interviews.
“That should be the end of the matter,” Mr Grehan told the court.
Mr Justice Birmingham said the court would reserve judgment and deliver its decision on the admissibility of the evidence before a full appeal takes place before the summer break.
