The trial of four associates of murderer Jozef Puska began this morning at the Central Criminal Court.
Puskas’ two brothers, Marek and Lubomir, and their partners, Viera Gaziova and Jozefina Grundzova, stand accused of offences related to the concealment of evidence that was relevant to a criminal investigation.
Counsel for the prosecution opened the trial by instructing the jury that the burden of proof in the case rests on the prosecuting side.
He outlined the last minutes of Ashling Murphy’s life and how the fitbit she had been wearing showed that her heart stopped beating at 15:31 pm on the 12th of January 2022, the day of her murder.
Although the jury were cautioned that Jozef Puska himself is not part of these proceedings, they would be shown a substantive amount of evidence in relation to him as the current case arises from his actions.
The court heard that Jozef Puska returned to the home he shared at the time with the four accused at the time of Murphy’s death.
A series of maps and photographs were handed to the jury to establish the areas of Tullamore that would be shown to them on CCTV.
Gardaí gave evidence that 25,000 hours of CCTV was harvested in order to piece together the movements of Jozef Puska on that day, a task undertaken by 11 members of An Garda Síochána who were part of an incident room established to investigate the young woman’s death.
Part of the CCTV showed Puska following another woman – who later made a Garda statement – on his bicycle before he killed Ms. Murphy.
The woman said that she was unaware that she was being followed at the time. Puska stopped following her when she entered a local Tesco store.
Puska was captured following a second woman – a Ms. Kelly – who was walking her dog on the same day. She also made a statement to Gardaí. Kelly said that she became aware that she was being followed when she passed a McDonalds and that Puska “stared at her”. In an exchange that was not captured on CCTV, Ms. Kelly said encountered him again on an area of the canal where Ms. Murphy died.
The court heard that there is “no CCTV whatsoever” along the canal.
There were no CCTV images captured of Jozef Puska from 14:05 pm until 20:25 pm that same night when he was seen at a garage.
At 21;01 he called to the home of a Slovakian man, Rostislav Pokuta, who agreed to drive Puska home to his Tullamore address.
Pokuta said that on this occasion, Puska was “shaking” that he was “nearly blue”, “wet” , “dirty with scratches” and “bleeding from his head”.
After the murder, Puska went to an address in Crumlin, Co. Dublin where his parents lived. Although CCTV from before the murder showed him with a beard, he was clean shaven in images captured from his time in Dublin in which he was conveyed to hospital.
The next CCTV images which clearly show Jozef Puska were captured the following morning at his parent’s address in Crumlin. Here the murderer could be seen wearing completely different clothes, including blue jeans and a black coat with fake fur on the hood. His facial hair remained.
Some time later he was seen being wheeled out of the same address by a paramedic and being put into an ambulance. At 12:13pm he arrived at the A&E of St. James’ Hospital where he was rolled around on a trolly covered in a light blue hospital blanket. He was now clean shaven.
He was met at the hospital by two Gardaí from Blanchardstown station.
The prosecution argues that the four accused withheld information from Gardaí and mislead them when they made voluntary statements in the aftermath of Ms. Murphy’s death.
Gardaí were unable to locate the clothing Puska was wearing at the time of the murder, namely a black jacket top with a small square white label on the left upper arm, and a black pair of Tommy Hilfiger bottoms with a large vertical white stripe featuring the word ‘Hilfiger’ on the outer sides of the legs.
The prosecution argues that these clothes were burned by the two female defendants.
All four were arrested on the 26th of January 2022.
Det Garda Caroline Hughes of the Garda Technical Bureau gave evidence that she and a number of colleagues attended the scene of the murder on the 13th of January 2022 when photographs were taken of the scene. These included images of Ms. Murphy’s light pink hat, and her blue and white Nike runners. The photos also showed some sticks, and an area of brambles where blood stains were present.
The trial continues before Ms. Justice Caroline Biggs on Thursday