A Dutchman suspected of killing Irish barman Damian Mooney in a frenzied attack in Amsterdam last summer has been arrested after turning himself in to Dutch police.
The 26-year-old Co Kilkenny man, who worked in Irish pub O'Donnells in Amsterdam, died of stab wounds after being attacked as he returned home from a nightclub on August 28th last.
The stabbing was described at the time by police as "an act of horrible violence on a scale rarely seen in Amsterdam".
It emerged yesterday that a man turned himself in to police after CCTV video footage showed him walking next to the Irishman shortly before he died. The footage, given to police by a company with offices near the scene, was shown on a local TV crime watch programme.
The 27-year-old suspect has a Dutch passport but is originally from Surinam, a former Dutch colony in South America. Police said they had kept the arrest secret "for tactical reasons" until yesterday.
The man is expected to appear before judges at a closed session of Amsterdam court on Friday where he may face a charge of murder or the reduced charge of manslaughter, a spokesman for Amsterdam's public prosecutor's office said.
Police spokesman Rob van der Veen said the suspect admitted meeting Mr Mooney but denied having anything to do with the attack. "We have had an extensive forensic investigation in this case and we are satisfied that there is no other suspect to be interviewed at this time", he said.