Taxi stab widow: I always wonder did he cry out

THE family of a ‘kind and selfless’ taxi driver have spoken of their ongoing anguish since he was stabbed and left to die on the side of the road.

Father-of-two Martin Mulligan, 53, died from stab wounds at Carnmore, Balriggan, Dundalk, Co. Louth, on September 28, 2015.

Joseph Hillen, 24, of Glendasha Road, Forkhill, Co. Armagh, was found guilty of his manslaughter in October.

In a harrowing victim-impact statement given to the Central Criminal Court, Mr Mulligan’s wife Gráinne, who met her husband when they were teenagers and were about to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary when he was killed, said: ‘We had so many wonderful years together, but not enough. Martin was and still is the love of my life.’

Before he left that Sunday evening, he told her: ‘I’m looking forward to tomorrow.’ They both had Mondays off, she explained, and would spend them together. ‘That was the last intimate moment I had with Martin.’

She described him as a ‘talker’ who was admired by ‘so many people’. He had a ‘wonderful sense of humour. Being funny was one of his greatest assets.’

His proudest achievement was his two girls, she said, adding she would always be haunted by the way her husband died: ‘On the side of the road, alone without me or his family around him.

‘I always wonder did he cry out for me.’

She added: ‘I always thought we would grow old together, looking after each other and enjoying our grandchildren.’

His youngest daughter Shauna told the hearing that her family are facing their fourth Christmas without him and are still suffering agonising grief.

She said he was ‘brutally, viciously and inhumanely killed for no fault of his own’.

At the sentence hearing yesterday in front of Judge Eileen Creedon, Shauna said she had the ‘privilege and honour of having my dad in my life for 25 years’.

She remembered him as ‘hardworking, caring, loving, beautiful, patient, intelligent, amusing and affectionate’.

The circumstances of his death have left her ‘vulnerable and afraid to face life without him’, she said in her statement.

His eldest daughter Sharon remembered his ‘kindness and selflessness’ and recounted how when their next-door neighbour’s father died, Mr Mulligan took care of their youngest boy Cian, picking him up from school and taking him to football. She said: ‘My son will never meet the grandad he would have loved... I know he would have played a major role in my son’s [life].’

The court had heard that on the night he died he dropped off his last fare at Forkhill, Co. Armagh at 1.45am. His body was found at 3.06am a short distance from his taxi at Carnmore. He had suffered two stab wounds, one to the abdomen that severed the aorta and another to his right thigh that also severed an artery.

In Garda interviews, Hillen denied any knowledge of what happened to Mr Mulligan but this year he gave a voluntary statement in which he said he was driving when he saw Mr Mulligan at a plot of land owned by his friend. There had been trouble with illegal dumping at the site and Hillen thought Mr Mulligan was dumping rubbish from his car. There was a short car chase followed by a scuffle during which Hillen said the deceased pulled a knife on him.

Hillen said he managed to ‘flip the knife’ and while being struck from above he ‘jabbed out’ twice and inflicted the fatal wounds.

Judge Creedon adjourned sentencing until January 28.

‘My son will never meet his grandad’