The Gamal (49 page)

—Cuts. That’s what the police called them. Cuts. Can we return, please, to photograph 15 in exhibit 6, item 3. As you can see the deceased put up quite a fight to protect herself.

—Objection.

—Sustained.

—These appear, as indicated by Detective Crowley and the forensic pathologist, to be consistent with cuts and scratches inflicted on an attacker by a fit and able-bodied young woman. And we saw other examples of rapists and murderers who had been injured in very similar ways. Now if I could continue. Let us look in particular at the severity of the cuts. The cuts are quite severe, including two particularly nasty ones on his left cheek. Mr Hennebry, what did you decide to do about these cuts the next morning?

—I put my mother’s make-up on them. I didn’t want her to think I was in a fight.

—Interesting. So you admit now that these were not merely a little scratch or two. These are in fact evidence of a fight.

—No.

—A fight for life.

—No. I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill Sinéad.

—You were jealous of James and you wanted his girlfriend. You set about their destruction in the most evil of ways.

—I admit that I did know long ago that she’d been raped by the Little Rascal and what I did was wrong. I admit that. And I don’t know why I did it. But I swear I don’t know what happened Sinéad. I just don’t know why I did those nasty things like I did.

—You don’t know. Prisons are full of murderers who don’t understand their own motives, ladies and gentlemen.

—It’s not like that.

—What is it like, Mr Hennebry? Tell us.

—Yes. Like, I took that scarf that time. And I knew what I was doing when I gave it to the Rascal. And the damage I was doing to Sinéad and James. It was pure rotten and I’m ashamed I done it. And I know it makes me look pure rotten. I can’t understand it. Why I did it.

—A sociopath is someone who lacks empathy with people. I think you’re a sociopath, Mr Hennebry, and I’ll tell you why. You set about the destruction of a young man who regarded you as his closest friend. You allowed James to think Sinéad was unfaithful to him when you knew otherwise. You covered up the actions of a violent rapist, causing his victim untold suffering. You framed the poor girl further by stealing her scarf and giving it to her rapist in order to put the nail in the coffin of the relationship of Sinéad and James. This, again, caused them untold suffering. I think you raped and murdered Sinéad. And during this trial you have tried to frame poor Charlie McCarthy by saying he killed her. How much pain and suffering are you willing to cause people, Mr Hennebry? I’ll answer that for you. There is no limit to the pain and suffering you are willing to cause. Because the pain and suffering of others means nothing to you. You are a liar. You are evil. You are a rare and cold-blooded creature. You are a killer. What do you say to that, Mr Hennebry?

—Well . . . I’m not. I’m not evil. And I don’t know if Charlie McCarthy had anything to do with it either. Or if there was a pact or if Sinéad wanted to set me up and Charlie went down after and choked her. Or if it was some straggler or some fisherman or I dunno. But I didn’t kill her.

Dinky starts crying then and I could hear his mother crying below too.

—It wasn’t me. I swear to God. I swear to God. I did some bad stuff but I didn’t do that. Please. Please. Ye can’t . . . I didn’t . . .

The judge scratched his cheek and the lawyer continued.

—All of the evidence says otherwise. I think you are a liar and I think you are a coward for not admitting what you’ve done and apologising to the deceased’s family. Shame on you, Mr Hennebry. Shame on you. I’m done, Your Lordship.

—We’ll take a recess for fifteen minutes.

Dinky was sobbing and sniffling and he staggering out of the witness stand, with the garda’s hand on his arm, leading him out.

My visit to Dr Quinn today was different. He thinks I’m the best fella ever now. Instead of the office we walked around the grounds of the hospital for an hour. He was thanking me for engaging with the process as if I engaged with the process. He’s a fierce fan of the process like the hippy one in school long ago. And he was thanking me for trusting him as if I trusted him. And he was saying how he was amazed with the progress I was after making as if he knew the thoughts in my head.

Afterwards I got the bus into the city centre for a walk around. Walked up towards St Francis church and I could see they’d balloons and bunting and signs and all kinds of shite up and when I got to the church I heard music so I went in. On the poster at the back of the church it said Cork Culture presents The Sirene Ensemble. Bit like Sinéad. The Sirene Ensemble. ‘Les Béatitudes’ was the one I heard cos I robbed a programme at the back of the church. Last song it was. I missed the rest but I heard this one. So I was happy I heard this one. Would have heard more if Dr Quinn shut his hole. This music made me sick. An old man came up to me outside the church telling me to move on and I told him to fuck off and I vomited again. He thought I was a bum. The bums hang around the churches in Cork for warmth. After I finished vomiting I hung around and watched these foreign ones packing up after. The singers. Then they went away in a van and two cars to some place else on their music travels that wasn’t Ireland and I suppose I half wished I was with them. Not sure why it made me think of Sinéad so much but it wasn’t the voices. Might have been the hairs on the back of my neck. Give you the creeps like a ghost story.

‘Les Béatitudes’ goes here. I dunno what language it was. There’s a million different ones on the internet. But it was one I didn’t understand the words of so you must write out one from a language you don’t know. Find it and listen to it. The words won’t distract you from the music too much cos you won’t know what they mean. Blessed are those who never met me.

Voices. No instruments only voices. Plenty of them singing. Like your man that Sinéad liked. On the Holocaust memorial from the telly. Fat fella singing with a crowd around him. The others were dark-skinned and black-haired but this fella was the odd one out. This fella was pushed around on the playground. Fat pink head on him with funny teeth and goggly eyes. And gingery hair. A freckleface in a land of no freckles. He was up at the mic and the lads who might have bullied him were singing along with him. Or sounded like it was against him sometimes. Those were the best bits, Sinéad said. The pink head on the odd one out was gone purple by the end of it. Make you think of. Of nothing. Just listen like. Your fucking ears became your brain. Or your brain became your ears. Went on for the bones of fifteen minutes. I don’t know where the video of it is now. It’s not in the castle any more anyhow. But if you had it. If you had this video where James’ mother had the commemoration thing recorded, the picture would go to shit when you reached the odd one out singing. The tape was worn out. James just lied on the floor next to it and would rewind for Sinéad every time the odd one out came to the end of whatever strange cry of a song it was that he was singing. If I had to guess how many times we watched it over that Christmas holidays I’d say about one hundred and seventeen times. Sinéad knew the most of it anyhow by the end, whatever language it was.

Makes me think of the Russian Creed too. That was a record. Big old crackly one. Must have been James’ father’s. Or maybe his grandfather’s. One time James had the wrong time for a match cos Dinky told him it was on at half seven but it was really on at half six. I knew it was half six it was on but I wanted to see what Dinky was up to cos I knew they wouldn’t play the match without James cos it was on in the local pitch. A stone’s throw from the castle. Dinky had been up the day before and thought they were bonkers listening to the Russian Creed up full blast over and over and over. So anyhow I could see them out the window of the library. The whole team was out on the pitch and they trying to shout for James but all that could be heard out over the eastern fall of the valley that evening was the Russian Creed. In the end they stopped shouting, just looked up at the castle to us between the kicks of the ball in the warm-up. It was the trainer that had to get James. The doorbell wasn’t heard so he came in the front door and up the stairs into us. The look on James’ face and the trainer’s face was the same. They were shocked. James turned off the music and the trainer goes,

—What in the name of sweet suffering fuck are you up to James? You’ve a fucking match below now.

James looked up and smiled and gave us two big thumbs up from the window of the car and the trainer speeding off down the drive. Sinéad put on the song once more before we left. She said it was intimacy. That music. That’s what she said about it. Intimacy. For the people singing it and hearing it. No going back after sharing something like that she said. Intimacy.

The State’s Case

Now, ladies and gentlemen I am invited to argue the case on behalf of the Irish state. But I’m not going to argue with you, ladies and gentlemen. What I’m going to do, in summing up, is discuss the reasonable conclusions which can be drawn from the evidence we have heard.

Mr Cole’s summing-up was excellent, I’m sure you will all agree. A very skilled speech which opened up many possibilities – among them the possibility that his client, Denis Hennebry, may be innocent. My summing-up will be very different from Mr Cole’s. Mainly because my summing-up will not be based around conjecture and ‘what ifs’. No. My summing-up will be entirely based around fact. And what we call, in the very serious business of criminal law, hard evidence. Hard evidence and facts, ladies and gentlemen. Hard evidence and facts.

Now I’m not sure if I have Mr Cole’s eloquence. I’m not sure if my voice is as pleasant to the ear of the listener. And as I listened to him carefully yesterday, and saw how attentively you listened to him ladies and gentlemen, I could not help but hope that I might have your attention in the same way – despite my . . . well, my less honed oratory skills and my gravelly voice . . . and my old suit . . . and my age.

They say image is everything nowadays. If it is, I’m at a disadvantage. However, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that those who say image is everything are wrong. Justice, ladies and gentlemen, justice is everything. Image, varnish, gloss, depiction, portrayal, speculation, inference, assumption, guesswork, imagining, shot in the dark, conjecture, ‘what ifs’. They all come to nothing beside facts. Evidence and facts, ladies and gentlemen. Evidence and facts. Justice is everything. Evidence . . . and facts. The rest, ladies and gentlemen, is distraction. Skilful distraction. Cynical distraction. But the old school taught us that evidence and facts alone will bring us justice. My wife always tells me on my way out to a big court case, she says, ‘Justice is good and God is good.’ Justice. Facts and evidence. Evidence and facts. Don’t let your view be clouded by anything which is not evidence. Don’t let your view be clouded by anything which is not fact. Justice, ladies and gentlemen. May justice prevail.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. In the science of medical diagnosis, doctors have a term for when you diagnose something quite common as something extremely rare and unusual. They call it a zebra. If something looks like a horse. Sounds like a horse. Feels like a horse. Acts like a horse. Then it’s probably a horse. Not a zebra. What we have here, ladies and gentlemen, is the equivalent of the zebra diagnosis in the world of criminal law. But do not let this analogy deflect from the seriousness of this situation. This is a very calculated, sly and bold move by the defendant and his counsel to put doubt in your minds as to his guilt. Remember to always keep in your mind the key words for justice – evidence and facts.

What exactly are they suggesting? Are they really suggesting that poor innocent, harmless, hapless Charlie McCarthy had entered into a pact with Sinéad and strangled her? Is this really plausible? In light of the physical forensic evidence? In light of the character witnesses that have spoken on Charlie’s behalf? Is this plausible? Is this a reasonable suggestion? The answer, of course, is no. We have heard many despicable things in this trial. But this, unfortunately, in this court case of law, is yet another abomination. A disgrace. Trying, in desperation, grasping at straws, a shot in the dark, trying, in one last throw of the dice to try and implicate poor harmless Charlie McCarthy in the murder, or so-called assisted suicide . . . of Sinéad Halloran is nothing short of scandalous.

Let us now examine the facts and the evidence that Denis Hennebry’s counsel have put forward to support this silly notion. Well, what have we got? Nothing. Not a thing. Not a single fact. Not a single iota of evidence to back up this so-called theory. But theory is too good a word. It’s fantasy. It’s a big elaborate parcel with absolutely nothing in it. All the fancy language and ideas in the world won’t deflect us. No evidence. No facts. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

I implore you to respect our legal system as much as I do and banish such an outlandish and ridiculous thought from your minds. Evidence and facts, ladies and gentlemen. And excuse me if I appear angry. My profession are trained and expected not to let emotion govern our thoughts and words in the courts of law. Today . . . for the first time in my long professional life . . . I find it very difficult to control my fury. My anger. My outrage at this cynical, unjust and despicable ploy by Denis Hennebry and his counsel. Let us do a good job, for God’s sake and for goodness’ sake, for society’s sake, for all our sakes, for Sinéad Halloran’s sake. We are all part of the Irish justice system today. I implore you to make a judgement which is morally correct. I implore you not to be distracted from the issues at hand. The guilt or innocence of one Denis Hennebry. That’s what the issue is here. Let us call it as it is. A horse looks like a horse. Fact. A horse sounds like a horse. Fact. A horse behaves like a horse. Fact. Ladies and gentlemen, a horse is not a zebra. A horse . . . is . . . of course . . . a horse. May justice be served. Evidence and fact. Evidence and fact. Everything else is froth. We’ll forget about fancy talk and ridiculous notions. The facts and the evidence are everything. Evidence and fact. Justice is justice. Rape is rape. Murder is murder. Evil is evil. Guilt is guilt.