The Rattling of Sabres.

Samantha Conroy will have a stressful bank holiday weekend.  The 18-year-old daughter of Ronald McManus, the man accused of murdering Sligo teenager Melissa Mahon has been giving evidence for the past two days.  She will have to resume her cross examination on Tuesday.

It’s hardly surprising she’s being interrogated for so long.  The story she tells is very damning.  She says that she saw the aftermath of Melissa’s death and helped her father dispose of the body.  She is the name in the second charge, that her father threatened to kill her.  In these circumstances her evidence is crucial.

For the later part of this week the entire court has shifted to a different court room.  The Four Courts is a historic building and sometimes rather behind the times where technology is concerned.  One of my colleagues asked me during the week if we had access to wifi anywhere in the courts complex…I couldn’t help laughing.  Wifi is a precious commodoty in a complex where, if evidence must be heard via video link, the entire court must decamp and shift to the one courtroom set up for this eventuality.

Since video link evidence is a possible requirement in any trial with young witnesses this shifting of courts happens quite regularly.  Unfortunately, the courtroom that can take the video links is quite a bit smaller than the main courtrooms that open off the Round Hall.  Murder trials tend to require a lot of personnel and the witness list will frequently be long and involved.  When you factor in the fact that murder trials are the ones that tend to get the most media attention and therefore the largest press pack, you begin to get a very crowded courtroom.

Matters got so cramped on Thursday that the accused had to move into the witness box so that he could see his daughter’s evidence and there he has sat, on a level with the jury box on the opposite side of the room, taking reams of notes and watching her face intently on the two large screens hanging over the judges bench.

Samantha gave her principal evidence on Thursday so the following day it was the turn of defence counsel Brendan Greahan to cross examine.  On Thursday Samantha had answered every question politly, speaking in a soft English accent.  She had taken great care to include a wealth of detail, taking time to answer each question.

Once the cross examination started and the questions became less gentle and more probing her demeanour changed.  Her head cocked on one side, she answered many questions cheekily but Mr Greahan plowed on needling away at each detail of her account.  Thier swords first crossed as he started his cross examination detailing each statement she had given to the gardai.

“You have had all your statements?  Did you read them?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s very stressful to read over evidence.  Do you not think I’ve suffered enough?”

Mr Greahan led her through each detail of her account, stopping to test each piece.  Why did she claim to have switched rooms in the middle of the night the night before she said Melissa was killed.  Because she preferred the smaller bedroom, she answered, Melissa hadn’t come to bed in her room so she moved.  It had been dark when she moved she said so she hadn’t noticed anyone sleeping in the room’s second bed.

Mr Greahan pushed further.  She had said that her father took her and her sister to watch him play football as usual after they had disposed of the body.  What time was this?  Half 8.  Was she sure?  Absolutely.  But another witness would say football took place from 7 till 8.  It was half 8.

And again, what way was Melissa lying when Samantha saw her on the bed, allegedly after her father had strangled her.  She was lying on one arm with the other along her side.  And what way was her father lying, where was his arm.

Samantha stuck to her story, her face often furrowed with concentration.  She answered every question put to her and the exchanges came thick and fast.  Why had she and her sister done what her father told them in disposing of the body.  Why hadn’t they told anyone for almost 18 months?

Samantha replied again and again with the same words, a descriptive phrase learnt perhaps in counselling.  Her father was “a very controlling man”. Eventually Mr Greahan showed exasperation hearing the same phrase again and again.  You keep saying that.  And I’ll keep saying saying it.  It’s the truth.

“You don’t know my father.  I do.  I had been living with my father for fifteen years of my life.  You have just been reading his statements.”

She agreed that she had stolen regularly in the past, robbing makeup and sweets from Tesco and chemist shops around town.  She insisted though that she had never taken anything more than makeup from the chemists although she did admit to taking cocaine once.

But it was when Mr Greahan began to read large chunks of her younger sister’s statements giving several completely different accounts of Melissa’s death that Samantha looked her most incredulous.  She screwed up her face, her head tilting even further to one side as it was suggested to her that she had hit Melissa over the head with a frying pan, or threatened her little sister with a ktichen knife after admitting to hitting Melissa with a piece of wood.

I hope Samantha gets some rest over the weekend.  It can’t be easy going through a cross examination and hers is due to continue on Tuesday.  The battle lines will be redrawn as the defence and the prosecution try to get to the bottom of what happened to Melissa Mahon for the jury.