Jury finds O'Reilly guilty of murder

copacetic

spurious wrote:

When a woman is murdered, unless she is some sort of 'Ma Baker' type, the vast majority are at the hands of husband/boyfriend/partner. It should be (and AFAIK is) the first place police look.

exactly, god forbid your wife/partner is even killed, based on this case unless you had a cast iron alibi you could be convicted.

piste wrote:

I think one of JOR's major mistakes was refusing to take the stand. Surely if he were innocent he'd want to fight tooth and nail. Perhaps he thought it was a lost cause and that he couldn't keep up the innocent charade on stand?

or maybe he thought that they had so little evidence that he couldn't be convicted?

Dudess

copacetic: Holy sh1t! I was just discussing that film with someone a few minutes ago!

dame

copacetic wrote:

or maybe he thought that they had so little evidence that he couldn't be convicted?

Then why not take the stand? He did have the option after all. If he was innocent surely he'd have wanted to do everything in his power (like taking the stand) to make sure he impressed on the jury how utterly innocent he was? When you're on trial for murder is not the time to be complacent or apathetic.

Piste

copacetic wrote:

or maybe he thought that they had so little evidence that he couldn't be convicted?

That is a dangerous, dangerous assumption for him to make. He should have taken the stand just to be safe.

nesf

gilroyb wrote:

People keep saying "I'm sure he did it", but don't think the evidence was strong enough. If the evidence is strong enough to make you sure he did it, then it's strong enough. CSI is not real life.

I'd draw a very strong distinction between the level of proof I require to "be sure" about something or "think that something happened" and the level of proof needed to convict someone.

It's absolutely identical in science. The level of proof needed to verify something in economics is far far lower than the level of proof needed to verify something in physics or chemistry. But you could claim to be sure about something in either instance.

There are many many different levels of "being sure about something". Civil and criminal courts draw that distinction iirc.

copacetic

Dudess wrote:

copacetic: Holy sh1t! I was just discussing that film with someone a few minutes ago!

it's a fave of mine since school days, I always remember that quote (not off by heart - got it off the web)

I'm playing devils advocate a bit here, joe o'reilly = murdering scumbag, I'm on board with that. Justice was done, but was it seen to be done? Not so sure. This a slippery slope is my worry.

Also there have been similar murders in the last few years that never went to court, the husband normally being the main suspect. Does this result mean that we may see more of them go to trial?

dame

I wonder what his family think? I'm sure they'll probably publicly stand by him but I wonder if they secretly think that yes, he did it?

copacetic

Piste wrote:

That is a dangerous, dangerous assumption for him to make. He should have taken the stand just to be safe.

I'm just saying that the jury should have taken no note of the fact he didn't testify (well thats my understanding).

@dame but, he doesn't have to show or prove anything, it's supposed to be the other way around.

Dudess

I studied sociology of crime and the media and learned that the popular misconception when it comes to particularly attacks on women, is that some random stranger might be responsible (probably due to too much crime drama on TV) when in actual fact, it's far more likely to be a partner/spouse or ex-partner/spouse.

Piste

copacetic wrote:

I'm just saying that the jury should have taken no note of the fact he didn't testify (well thats my understanding).

Yeah I agree, should have, but I'm sure they noticed it and it influenced them a bit.

Dudess wrote:

I studied sociology of crime and the media and learned that the popular misconception when it comes to particularly attacks on women, is that some random stranger might be responsible (probably due to too much crime drama on TV) when in actual fact, it's far more likely to be a partner/spouse or ex-partner/spouse.

I thought that was common knowledge?

copacetic

Dudess wrote:

I studied sociology of crime and the media and learned that the popular misconception when it comes to particularly attacks on women, is that some random stranger might be responsible (probably due to too much crime drama on TV) when in actual fact, it's far more likely to be a partner/spouse or ex-partner/spouse.

I think thats true, but I'd hate to be in the position where you just lost your partner and then everyone assumes you killed her. Basically as I said above you are fecked unless you had a cast iron alibi.

jimmycrackcorm

There'll now be another murder trial for a husband suspected of murdering his wife at home in south Dublin. This also will only come to court on circumstantial evidence and in particular the husbands alibi is wiped out based on the same mobile phone evidence.

The husbands of three women murdered in Ireland in the last few years were and are the prime suspects and only circumstantial evidence is available in each. After I read about the third it struck me that the Gardai were going to have to take a the JOR case to court otherwise it looks like it would be easy to murder your wife and get away with it. With only circumstantial evidence to go on it was going to have to be worth the cost to pursue it even if had a significant chance of failure.

I don't know how anyone posting can think that the conviction was weak. It was pretty clear that O'Reillys alibi was false based on the scientific mobile evidence. Had he instead said he was inspecting billboards in north Dublin at the time then there would have been no conviction.

Anyway, some advice for those thinking of murdering an unloved one, stick your mobile phone under a seat on a dublin bus and set it to silent auto answer. Ring it a few times during the business and then pick it up later...

One mans conviction is another mans saviour.

dame

@ copacetic: Oh I know, innocent until proven guilty and all of that, but if I was on trial for something so serious I'd want to do everything I could to help the jury (and general public) see that I was innocent. Even if he had been found not guilty there would always have been a few people who would have thought he did it and wondering why he didn't take the stand. Obviously that wouldn't have mattered if he had been cleared and was free, but still, not nice to have that suspicion forever more.

nesf

Dudess wrote:

I studied sociology of crime and the media and learned that the popular misconception when it comes to particularly attacks on women, is that some random stranger might be responsible (probably due to too much crime drama on TV) when in actual fact, it's far more likely to be a partner/spouse or ex-partner/spouse.

Or friend, or family member or an aquaintance. A complete stranger is rare enough from every set of statistics I've seen. It's similar with child abuse, except that it's far more likely to be a direct family relation in that case apparently.

county

cichlid child wrote:

no the judge said no grounds for appeal

surely anyone has the right to appeal,if not its a seriously fcuked up legal system this country has

Piste

That statistic thing is quite comforting to me as I don't *think* anyone I know wants to kill me



(I am never getting married....)

dame

Dudess wrote:

I studied sociology of crime and the media and learned that the popular misconception when it comes to particularly attacks on women, is that some random stranger might be responsible (probably due to too much crime drama on TV) when in actual fact, it's far more likely to be a partner/spouse or ex-partner/spouse.

BA is useful for all sorts of situations! Everyone knows it's usually a partner/husband/boyfriend/ex though.

nesf

jimmycrackcorm wrote:

I don't know how anyone posting can think that the conviction was weak. It was pretty clear that O'Reillys alibi was false based on the scientific mobile evidence. Had he instead said he was inspecting billboards in north Dublin at the time then there would have been no conviction.

Mobile evidence isn't infallable and can only really show that it's very likely that someone lied about their movements which isn't in itself enough to convict someone which is the problem. It was the additional CCTV footage that made it so strong in this case combined with the fact that there didn't seem to be any other possible explanation for his movements. As the guy on the news said, a web must be built and that can be tricky to do. Just showing that it's likely that someone did something isn't the same as showing that there isn't a plausable explanation showing that they didn't.

dame

This is only my own theory but I think carrying out all those re-enactments of the murder was his way of getting it off his chest.

Piste

Or his way of being an idiot and practically announcing "I knew exactly what I was doing and how to get away with it!"

He should at least have waited until he was aquitted and wrote a book about "how I *would* have killed my wife *if* I had been her killer".

Dudess

Re: my course.

Actually no, the lecturer said that, according to studies, the popular belief is that these are random attacks.

crosstownk

Piste wrote:

"I knew exactly what I was doing and how to get away with it!"

Yeah - that was most likely his angle - but it was so see through, tbh.

dame

Piste wrote:

Or his way of being an idiot and practically announcing "I knew exactly what I was doing and how to get away with it!"

He should at least have waited until he was aquitted and wrote a book about "how I *would* have killed my wife *if* I had been her killer".

True!

I'm sure the idea of shared custody doesn't seem so bad to him now compared with having the father in jail for the mother's murder.

I hope the two little boys get as much help as they need to get their heads around the whole situation as they grow up. They'll need it.

unkel

Piste wrote:

most of the evidence we have heard is purely circumstancial and very weak on its own. From a legal perspective I think the evidence was far too weak to convict him

copacetic wrote:

by this evidence getting convinctions they could basically convict whoever they decide is guilty by proving/implying a motive and opportunity and little else

Agreed and this worries me. On the other side, it's not long ago that a man murdered a traveller and was not even found guilty of manslaughtering him although every evidence ever needed was right there including all forensics and even admission

Our justice system is veering dangerously towards a lynch mob system imho

Tigrrrr

Red Alert wrote:

Just think when you're on a bus that Joe O'Reilly probably checked the ads on the back of it at some stage

OMG!! It could hav bin mee he killed!

ziggy

This post has been deleted.

Capt'n Midnight

I will say it again. In a murder case the victim can't testify in court.

Does this mean that if there are no witnesses and where killer leaves no foresic evidence the killer should go free ?

How many people in Ireland have been killed by burglers ?
How many women have been killed by strangers in their own houses where there wasn't a sexual crime ?

https://listserv.heanet.ie/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0202&L=irishlaw&D=0&P=6612&D=1

The manuscript on circumstantial evidence dates from
the 8th century and was translated last year by
Professor Fergus Kelly of the Dublin Institute for
Advanced Studies, a leading authority on early Irish
law. He and other scholars are painstakingly
converting a collection of about 100 documents that
have survived from the early Irish period into
English.

"People are fed up with history that consists of
battle, murder and sudden death," said Kelly. "They
are interested in the people and the society of the
time. These texts are some of the best material we
have for showing what that was about."

The document lists about 17 types of evidence that
could be used to prove a criminal's guilt in court.
They include sleeping excessively, threatening to
commit a crime before it happens and fraternising with
people of bad character. Kelly said he was surprised
by its detail - it notes differences between types of
footprint, and explains how finding a shoe or a glove
near the scene of a robbery could help identify a
thief. Relatives or friends of crime victims
usually undertook the investigations.

In a paper presented to a recent conference on Brehon
law, when Kelly First revealed the translation, he
also suggested investigators may have used classic
Sherlock Holmes deduction methods. For example, if a
family dog did not bark when a house was being robbed,
it could suggest that the thief was a friend of the
family.

If suspected criminals could get a number of people -
usually 30 or 60 - to act as character witnesses in a
case where only circumstantial evidence was available,
the charges were dropped.

copacetic

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

I will say it again. In a murder case the victim can't testify in court.

Does this mean that if there are no witnesses and where killer leaves no foresic evidence the killer should go free ?

How many people in Ireland have been killed by burglers ?
How many women have been killed by strangers in their own houses where there wasn't a sexual crime ?

what are you saying exactly though?

If you are saying that murder shouldn't have to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt because it is more difficult to do so, then you are calling into question our whole system of innocent until proven guilty.

unkel

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

if there are no witnesses and where killer leaves no foresic evidence the killer should go free ?

Yes, if there's no proof, the killer should not be convicted. Simple as

Obviously the jury system should be abolished. Or should it?

Amazotheamazing

People who think O'Reilly should have taken the stand clearly don't realise how smart top Barristers are, would you risk your freedom on your ability to outthink and outtalk a guy who's being paid to make you look guilty?

Snickers Man

Tigrrrr wrote:

I wouldn't put any money on the conviction standing up in the event of an appeal though.

Leave to appeal was refused. He's going dahhn.

Amazotheamazing

Snickers Man wrote:

Leave to appeal was refused. He's going dahhn.

He can still appeal, it limits the type of appeal he can take, afaik.

Irish Wolf

TheGooner wrote:

wrote a letter begging for forgiveness and put it in the coffin...

Really? Has this been proven?

patrickolee

cichlid child wrote:

no the judge said no grounds for appeal

Judge did say that but. The defense barrister asked something at the end about continuing legal aid. The judge agreed. Don't know why he would still need that if everything was done and dusted? Confused me. I think their asking for appeal and being refused is almost automatic. It doesn't mean there won't be an appeal in the future... i.e. if some new evidence, or irregularity came to light.

Irish Wolf

patrickolee wrote:

Judge did say that but. The defense barrister asked something at the end about continuing legal aid. The judge agreed. Don't know why he would still need that if everything was done and dusted? Confused me. I think their asking for appeal and being refused is almost automatic. It doesn't mean there won't be an appeal in the future... i.e. if some new evidence, or irregularity came to light.

I'm open for correction, as always - but afaik the judge said there's no leave for appeal - not no grounds for appeal..

Listening to NewsTalk tonight there are a couple of reasons that an appeal may be warranted.. the fact that there were 11 jurour not 12, and apparently the book of evidence was left in the jury room.. albeit technicalities, but cases have folded in the past based on a technicality..

patrickolee

Irish Wolf wrote:

I'm open for correction, as always - but afaik the judge said there's no leave for appeal - not no grounds for appeal..

I believe you are correct.

drumm23

In response to the "dangerous conviction" "circumstantial evidence" posts:
The burden of proof could not be simpler, it is beyond reasonable doubt.
Is it reasonable to think that Joe O'Reilly was not his wife's murderer, when it is, crucially, beyond all doubt that he travelled to the area of the Naul and was in the area of the Naul during the half-hour period when his wife was murdered; Yet, prior to this day, he had not travelled there any other day at this time?
No, it is not.
The circumstantial basis of this evidence is neither here nor there, because it is far beyond the realms of circumstance that he was in the area during this tiny period of time but was not actually the murderer. This was only reinforced by the actual circumstantial evidence that he had proven motive to commit her murder.
The mobile-phone evidence, combined with a total lack of alibi, was proof enough.
It really is beyond ironic that Rachel campaigned against the installation of the very mast that would identify her murderer.

Congratulaions to the superb work of the Gardai who have given much of their live's to this case and, at long last: Rest In Peace, Rachel.

seamus

Irish Wolf wrote:

Really? Has this been proven?

Yep, the body was exhumed, and the letter was photographed. It was one of the first pieces of evidence to be submitted. It implied a lot, but didn't really prove anything.

Irish Wolf

seamus wrote:

Yep, the body was exhumed, and the letter was photographed. It was one of the first pieces of evidence to be submitted. It implied a lot, but didn't really prove anything.

I heard the meeja talking about the letter that was placed in the coffin but didn't realise that the body had been exhumed.. but I was away for the start of the trial..

It will be interesting to see how the trial may go if it goes to appeal..

paulie42

TheGooner wrote:

Great news, im so happy for the family.

What a bastard he was, normal men just leave there wife not bludgeon her to death.

I firmly believe that his brother and sister had a part in the murder too. Think about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Irish Wolf

paulie42 wrote:

I firmly believe that his brother and sister had a part in the murder too. Think about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It may be your belief but it may be helpful to back it up with your opinion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

galactus

Well done jury!

When I saw O'Reilly on the Late Late appealing for any evidence that would lead to finding his wife's killer I knew there was something rotten.

Huggles

Irish Wolf wrote:

Really? Has this been proven?

Yes it was revealed on second day of evidence

Huggles

Irish Wolf wrote:

It may be your belief but it may be helpful to back it up with your opinion!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well I belive the Gardai would have gone through their movements also with a fine toothcomb and nothing apart from emails was presented against him.

In said emails he did make a point of saying his brother was too much of a hot head. We'll never know for sure but my gut instinct ays he's guilty. The stu we didn't hear in the trial and came out last night about him re enacting the murder for the family and sons is just weiiiiiiiiird!!!!

Time Magazine

unkel wrote:

Agreed and this worries me. On the other side, it's not long ago that a man murdered a traveller and was not even found guilty of manslaughtering him although every evidence ever needed was right there including all forensics and even admission

Our justice system is veering dangerously towards a lynch mob system imho

The nature of the criminal justice system is that a (supposed?) representation of the community is the judge, i.e. the jury. Juries have the power to convict someone with no evidence whatsoever or to refuse to convict with overwhelming evidence. This is not without its flaws.

Consider yourself in two positions. One, as an innocent man put on trial for murder. Two, as the brother/son/husband of someone who was raped and murdered. What better system is there other than a reasonable number (say twelve) randomers from our society to judge?

That's not rhetorical. If someone has a better idea I'd really like to hear it.

goldenbrown

his nasty emails to his nasty witch sister were a eureka moment, what a complete kn@cker - never let him out, now go get the alibi monkey from the bus depot:mad:

A Dub in Glasgo

Didn't know we had most of the jurors on boards.

Comments like the evidence was weak and not enough to convict. Other comments like 'it is obvious that he did it although not enough evidence to convict' make me laugh.

Has the trial transcript been released yet or do the boardsters here who think they know better than the jury have a copy?

philstar

just for future reference........are we only allowed to talk about a trial (on boards) once its finished???

DublinDilbert

It doesn't say much for security in phisbrough bus depot, does it?

No CCTV? No sign in book? i guess people can just walk in off the street...

is_that_so

I don't think this was a hang 'em high jury nor or many of us. Some of us perhaps need less covincing of his guilt and are quicker to accept the verdict. Even so there was an awful lot of circumstantial evidence that pointed to him yet it took two days to come to a very difficult decision.

This was not a case that was thrown together to get a conviction. The event itself happend in 2004.

Why as an innocent man did he not believe in the need to refute all the circumstantial evidence that had been built up against him? There were contradictions that he perhaps could have explained.