A woman whose husband and two sons are being tried for her murder died from strangulation, a pathologist told the Central Criminal Court yesterday.
Mr Joseph O'Brien (49) and two of his sons, Kieran (23) and Noel (22), have pleaded not guilty to the murder of Ms Julia O'Brien (44) at the family home in High Street, Drimoleague, Co Cork, early on Christmas Eve 1995. Pathologist Dr Margot Bolster detailed dozens of injuries to Ms O'Brien's body and six fractured ribs but said the "major cause" of death was manual strangulation.
She listed 18 separate cuts, bruises and abrasions to Ms O'Brien's head and neck alone, in addition to an older, yellow bruising over her left eyelid. Ms O'Brien's body had "multiple areas of bruising", Dr Bolster said, "in keeping with multiple blows and kicks to the body and stamping on the abdomen". There was "extensive haemorrhaging to the back of the scalp". The rib fractures were surrounded by bleeding and there was a further displaced fracture of a neck bone. An internal examination showed the brain was mildly swollen and there was a small laceration to her liver.
Ms O'Brien would "probably not" have died from those injuries alone, the pathologist told Mr Ralph Sutton SC, prosecuting. Strangulation was the "overwhelming" cause of death, she agreed with Mr Michael McMahon SC, for Mr Joseph O'Brien. However, the other injuries were "a contributory cause in that they would have caused shock", she told Mr Ciaran O'Loughlin SC, for Mr Noel O'Brien.
The old bruises on the deceased woman's limbs were consistent with the evidence that she had regularly fallen while drunk.
Tests showed a level of 310 milligrams of alcohol in the blood.
The pathologist said that when she examined the scene of the death on Christmas Eve 1995 in an upstairs bedroom there was "blood smeared on a bolster pillow, undersheet and duvet". An overturned lamp was also noted. A next-door neighbour of the O'Briens, Mr Michael O'Leary, told the jury he heard noises coming from the house at "around 10 past one in the morning" of Ms O'Brien's death. Asked by Mr Sutton how long the noises had been going on, he replied: "About 17 years."
Ms Elizabeth McCarthy, who lives in a house on the other side of the O'Briens, said that when she went outside to lock her back gate at around 1:15 a.m. she "could hear voices, and I thought I heard a cry". She thought it was Ms O'Brien. "It was a soft cry, a kind of emotional cry."
A friend of Ms O'Brien's daughter Miriam, Ms Claire O'Driscoll, said she had once seen Miriam with a black eye, and "Miriam said Julia had done it".
Claire's mother, Ms Mary O'Driscoll, said she had made several attempts to get the deceased woman to seek help for her drink problem "but she refused".
In 1994 when Miriam took an overdose of tablets, Ms O'Driscoll confronted her mother the following morning. "She denied she had a drink problem for a start and said Miriam was just bored," she recalled.
Ms O'Driscoll told the court she had fed the O'Brien children on occasion, "but they were very proud children, they held it all to themselves". "They loved their mother so much," she said. "They did love her."
Ms Mary McCarthy, of McCarthy's pub, Drimoleague, said Ms O'Brien visited her house at 11:20 p.m. on the night she died, showing her a Christmas present she had got from Noel and Kieran and promising her "she would bring me some mince pies" the next day. She left "walking unsteadily in the direction of home", Ms McCarthy told the court. She said Noel O'Brien "practically lived with us" because of his mother's drink problem. She said she had approached a doctor at one stage about the problem, but was told "there was nothing that could be done, that she had to admit it herself".
Several staff members and customers of local pubs also gave evidence. Mr Connie O'Driscoll said he saw Julia O'Brien leave Casey's Inn between 10.25 p.m. and 10.30 p.m. on the night she died. She told him she had "a pain in her chest", he said. Mr John Howard, a barman at Casey's, said Ms O'Brien had "nothing more than normal - a couple of whiskeys, that's all". The proprietor of Casey's Inn, Mr Donal Casey, said he had often seen her "a lot worse".
The trial continues.