The brutal murder of a 16-year-old girl by a youth was branded "a killing operation" by a judge today.
Thomas Purcell (18) from Windsor Road in Belfast, faces a long sentence for the murder of Megan McAlorum whom he battered to death at an isolated spot in a forest above Belfast.
Purcell pleaded guilty last month just before he was due to be tried for the killing in the early hours of Easter Sunday in April 2004 when he was just 16.
He has a string of previous convictions, including an arson attack in England in which £250,000 damage was caused to property owned by Sir Richard Branson, the court heard.
The grim details of the slaughter were recounted as he sat with head bowed in Belfast Crown Court. Such was the extent of submissions by the prosecution and defence that Mr Justice McLaughlin said he needed time to consider what minimum tariff the mandatory life sentence should carry.
He said he wanted to study the evidence and a statement submitted by the murdered girl's mother, Margaret, which was described in court as "a deeply moving document".
The sentence is expected to be passed next Wednesday.
The court heard there was significant evidence Megan was raped before being murdered, but outlining the prosecution case Mr John Orr QC, said while it was certain sex took place, rape could not be proved.
The accused insisted the sex had been consensual.
He said when reports were being drawn up following Purcell's change of plea to guilty, he told a psychologist. "I met the girl, we had sex. I got angry and killed her - that's all."
Later he elaborated, claiming that after consensual sex "she looked at me in a sneering way and said I was the first Gipsy she had had sex with. I lost it and beat the f*** out of her," the court heard.
Purcell punched the girl in the face breaking her jaw in two places then picked up a log and battered her around the head and face as she lay on the ground.
Post-mortem examination results showed death would have been almost instantaneous as she suffered multiple fractures to the skull and brain damage.
PA