The man accused of murdering journalist Veronica Guerin denied at the Special Criminal Court yesterday that he had disposed of the murder weapon or the motorbike used in the killing.
Mr Paul Ward told his counsel Mr Barry White: "I disposed of nothing whatsoever on that day." He said he had been at a house in Walkinstown Road, Dublin, on the day Ms Guerin was murdered and he said there had been no callers.
The prosecution has claimed that the two killers went to Mr Ward's house shortly after the murder in June 1996 and Ward disposed of the motorbike and the .357 Magnum used to murder the journalist.
Mr Ward was giving defence evidence on the 23rd day of the trial after the prosecution case against him finished yesterday ) afternoon. Earlier, prosecution witness Charles Bowden, who is currently in Arbour Hill Prison under the Witness Protection Programme, repeated his denial that he had been given the murder weapon by one of the killers and that he had disposed of it.
Mr Paul "Hippo" Ward (34), from Crumlin, Dublin, with an address at Walkinstown Road, Dublin, has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Ms Guerin (36), a mother of one, at the Naas Road, Clondalkin, Co Dublin on June 26th, 1996.
The prosecution has claimed that Mr Ward was a member of the gang that planned and carried out the killing and he disposed of the murder weapon and the motorcycle afterwards.
Mr Ward told his counsel that he had gone on holiday to Santa Ponsa in Spain with his girlfriend, Ms Vanessa Meehan, and other family members for a week from June 15th to 22nd, 1996. He said he had returned on the Saturday night and had gone to his bungalow in Walkinstown. Mr Ward said he had not met Bowden or other named members of the drugs gang, who cannot be identified by order of the court, on the Sunday. He said he remembered the day before Ms Guerin was shot because on that day he had gone looking for his niece, a drug addict, over an alleged theft.
While he and two of his brothers were looking for his niece they were stopped in the car park of the Coombe Hospital by a police car with two uniformed gardai. Two detectives, one of whom he knew, also appeared in another car. Mr Ward said he later found his niece walking in Pimlico.
"I hit her, which I am not proud of saying," he added. He took his niece back to the bungalow in Walkinstown Road, where he and Ms Meehan looked after her. Mr Ward said he did not leave his house on the morning of the day Ms Guerin was killed. No one called to the house and no one left anything at the house.
He said Ms Meehan may have left the house to go to her mother's in the evening. He did not meet the other named members of the drugs gang that evening in a pub but may have spoken to them by phone.
Mr Justice Barr told Ward that he did not have to say anything that might incriminate himself. Ward said he stayed in that night to "keep an eye" on his niece and there was no one else in the house that night.
He said he did not see Bowden on the Friday after Ms Guerin's murder. Mr Ward said that Bowden was more of an associate than a friend and he had not called to his bungalow that day.
Earlier, Bowden, cross-examined by Mr Patrick MacEntee for the defence, denied that he had met one of the killers in Moore Street on the day of the murder and that the killer had given him the gun to dispose of.
Bowden said he would have admitted disposing of the gun if he had done so and there was no reason for him not to tell the Garda if he had done so. He denied a suggestion by Mr MacEntee that his evidence was part of " a carefully laid scheme" to minimise his own role in the murder and to involve Mr Ward.
A retired detective sergeant, Des McTiernan, told the court that he had interviewed Bowden at Lucan Garda station after his arrest on October 5th, 1996. He said towards the end of the interview he had an album of photos of Ms Guerin at the murder scene, which he placed in front of Bowden.
"I admit I was at the end of my tether. It was a long, long tether. It was partly out of sheer frustration I put down the photographs." Det Sgt McTiernan said that after he showed Bowden the photos, Bowden said nothing.