A CAVAN man has been found guilty of murder by a jury at the Central Criminal Court.
The jury of eight women and four men had been deliberating since Thursday, for seven hours and 25 minutes, before returning its majority verdict of 10 to two.
Trevor McCabe (35), Mountpleasant, Ballyconnell, Co Cavan, pleaded not guilty to murdering Darren McGrath (33), a father of one, in Belturbet, Co Cavan on May 20th, 2008.
McCabe was remanded in custody until next Monday when he will be formally sentenced.
The court had previously heard this was a retrial after the first jury failed to reach a verdict and was discharged last year. It was the prosecution’s case that McCabe shot Mr McGrath twice in the head as he lay in bed asleep.
During the 10-day trial, presided over by Mr Justice Barry White, the court heard Nicole Lennon (21), Mr McGrath’s fiancee and mother of his child, had woken to find a gunman in her bedroom and had seen him shoot Mr McGrath twice in the head as he slept beside her.
Ms Lennon said she heard a bang and then the man leaned over her to get closer before firing the second shot. She pointed at McCabe in court and said: “It was him. I don’t want to look at him but it was him.”
Darren Murphy, a neighbour, told the court he saw two men running from Mr McGrath’s house. “I saw two people running around the wall and the second person had a bad limp on the left side.”
The court had heard McCabe was involved in a road traffic accident in 2007 in which his left leg was badly injured.
Patrick McKiernan (34) gave evidence that he had spent the afternoon before the shooting with the accused, drinking on a boat on Lough Erne, near Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh.
He told the court he had been drinking heavily and he fell asleep in McCabe’s car.
When he woke, he realised he was outside Mr McGrath’s house. He said: “I met Trevor coming down the stairs and he said: ‘Get out’.”
Mr McKiernan said the accused was carrying a “short shotgun” when he was leaving the house.
The court had heard that a bag containing items of clothing, including a pair of green combat trousers and an Adidas jacket had been left at a Spar shop in Dromore, Co Tyrone, the evening after the shooting.
DNA from McCabe and firearm residue were found on the combat trousers but McCabe could not be linked to the Adidas jacket.
The jury was shown CCTV footage from a lakeside filling station in Enniskillen, recorded two hours before the shooting, which showed a man walking with a limp and wearing clothing similar to that found in the bag in Dromore.
The man recorded in the footage was identified by Det Garda Paul Cullen as McCabe.
Mr Justice White excused the jury from further service for life.