Mary Mahon dabbed her eyes with a tissue, the tears welling up in the first show of emotion since the trial of the man accused of murdering her daughter Melissa began.  Her husband Frederick hung his head, looking away from the photographs visible on the barristers desk in front of him.  On the sixth day of the trial of Ronald McManus, the prosecution had turned their attention to the discovery of Melissa’s remains, 18 months after she had disappeared from care.

The Mahon family might have been dysfunctional, Melissa was not the first of their children to be taken into care, but the site of the pitiful fragments of bone that were all that was left of their youngest child by the time the tidal lake at Lough Gill had done it’s work, was too much for her parents.  After a few whispered words the Mahon’s got up and quietly left the court, leaving behind the litany of fragments all documented in photograph after photograph that now form part of the prosecution case.

Gardai had been led to the shores of Lough Gill by one of the accused man’s three daughters.  At the start of the trial the jury heard that Samantha Conway, Ronald McManus’s middle daughter, will tell the court that her father brought her and her younger sister with him when he dumped Melissa’s body in a river that feeds into Lough Gill.

Ronald McManus denies the murder of Melissa Mahon in September 2006, somewhere in Sligo.  He also denies threatening to kill his daughter Samantha.  Samantha has not yet taken the stand.  Today’s evidence was a record of the discovery of Melissa’s remains, found scattered along the shores of Lough Gill some distance from the spot Samantha is expected to claim the body was dumped at.

Today the jury watched video footage of the drive from McManus’s house in Rathbraughan Park to the banks of the River Bonnet.  The footage showed the rain soaked streets around Sligo on the dismal February day in 2008 Samantha showed detectives the route she said she had travelled with her father and her sister with Melissa’s body eighteen months before.  At the end of the road trip was a clearing, all brown bushes and winter mud.  The route to the river was only accessible on foot and the footage showed wellingtoned gardai pointing out elements of interest in the short walk, their comments muted for court.

Further footage showed a boat trip tracking the supposed trajectory of the body dragged by the current to it’s final resting place.

Book after book of photographs showed the grim discovery made by gardai at the site.  A sodden sleeping bag tied around the feet with a man’s tie, a faded nightdress with the Beauty and the Beast design still just visible, a pink bra found snagged on a tree.  All these finds would have been palatable, removed from the immediacy of death, but they weren’t the only things found.

Photograph after photograph followed for each small piece of bone that were all that was left of Melissa; matted hanks of black hair found snagged on bushes, a jawbone, individual teeth, a femur, fibula, shoulder bone.  Individual vertebrae each photographed in situe and again, neatly categorized back in the garda station.  Pitted, broken fragments of skull found washed up on the lake shore.

In the days to come we will hear from State Pathologist Marie Cassidy and an anthropologist to make sense of the jigsaw found in the tangled undergrowth in such a peaceful location.

Ronald McManus turned through the photographic book of bones as each photograph was formally introduced as evidence, showing the paltry remains of the girl who had called him father.  He sat as he has sat throughout the trial to date, watching intently, glancing occasionally at the jury or Melissa’s parents.  Every now and then he will call to his solicitor and whisper instructions for his defence team.  Today as the photographs were introduced he was quiet, staring at each photograph in turn.

Tomorrow the trial will move into a different area of evidence, a respite from the gruesome remains.  It is expected to continue for several more weeks before the prosecution finish their case and the defence can have their say.