Son, 27, guilty of mum’s murder
Killer caged for life after jury convicts him of brutal stabbing
A MAN who stabbed his mother to death trying to free her from the “cruelty of the world” was jailed for life yesterday.
A jury found Paul Horgan guilty of murder following more than an hour of deliberations at the Central Criminal Court in Cork.
The killer had pleaded not guilty to the murder of his mother, Marian, 60, at their home on November 23, 2015.
Justice Pat Mccarthy jailed Horgan, 27, for life after the guilty verdict was returned following a three-day trial.
In the witness box yesterday the accused said he accepted that he had killed his mother.
Horgan added he was trying to set her free from the cruelty of the world and that he planned to similarly “free” both his father Billy and himself afterwards.
The unemployed only son in the family said he only could conjure up bits and pieces of the events of the morning of the death of his mother.
Asked by his defence counsel if he intended to kill Marian he said: “No, it was that I wanted to set her free more than I meant to kill her.”
Later during evidence he was asked about his assault on his father and he replied, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean it at all”.
He said he and his mother generally got on even though they were not speaking at the time of the murder.
Horgan, of Murmont Avenue, Cork city, added he recalled parts of the stabbing when he was sitting down to his Christmas dinner in the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum a month after the killing.
He said: “My thoughts about it were afterwards – I don’t know what I was thinking during it – I did not intend to kill her, I intended to set her free because life is so cruel – my own life was cruel too. I wanted to set her free, my mother did not deserve cruelty.”
The court heard Horgan recalled whistling a “marching tune” as he went upstairs to put his runners on after stabbing his mother.
He told the court that it was difficult to hear the evidence.
Horgan said: “It was horrible – it was hard to listen to everything.”
Prosecutor Tom Creed said a consultant psychiatrist at the CMH had indicated Horgan was not suffering from a psychiatric illness at the time of the stabbing.
Assistant State Pathologist Dr Margaret Bolster previously told the court Mrs Horgan suffered two stab wounds in the incident.
One was to the right shoulder and the fatal wound was to the back left of the skull. The accused’s father Billy previously told the court he went down to the kitchen in the family home one morning to find his wife collapsing and asking for help after she had been stabbed in the throat by their son who then assaulted him.
Mr Horgan told Justice Pat Mccarthy that he and his wife had been married for 39 years.
He said his son Paul had no history of violence and wasn’t on any medication at the time of the incident.
He was doing a computer course but hadn’t worked for a few years.
At 7am on the day of the murder, Mr Horgan heard what sounded like an argument between Marian and
I intended to set her free because life is so cruel PAUL HORGAN ON NIGHT OF MURDER
Paul in the kitchen. It was just raised voices and he didn’t think it was anything exceptional.
He went down to the kitchen where he found that Marian had a knife stuck in her throat.
She said, “Help me”. He tried to go to the assistance of his wife but she “fell to the floor”.
He told the court he said, “Look what you are after doing to your mother” to his son.
He said Paul appeared calm and was smiling.
Mr Horgan stated his son went for him and struck him with something at the side of the head. He ended up on the floor next to his wife Marian. Mr Horgan said he had a stinging pain in his head.
He said he ran from the house and his son came after him “clicking” knives.
Neighbour Fergus O’donoghue told the court he was dropping his child to school.
An item was forgotten and he returned home to see two figures in the porch of the Horgan home.
Mr O’donoghue told the court Billy Horgan was covered in blood.
He said Paul was “relaxed and cool” and that the accused was trying to get at his father but he was able to restrain him. Mr O’donoghue said he went in to the Horgan house and that it was “quite clear that there wasn’t anything you could do” for Marian.
Mr O’donoghue said gardai were contacted and the emergency services alerted.
Marian was pronounced dead at the scene at 8.18am by Dr Jason Van der Veldt.
Paul was arrested for assault causing harm to his mother.
A doctor assessed him at the local Garda station and saw no sign of psychosis or psychiatric illness.