Man accused of telling partner’s mother that her son had died
The case against a 38 year old man accused of telephoning his partner’s mother and falsely telling her that her son had died was dropped by the prosecution on the second day of his trial at Sligo Circuit Court.
The prosecution entered a nolle prosecqui and the case against Francis Kavanagh Smith of 44 Castlegrove, Ballymote was withdrawn from the jury.
It was alleged that the accused had harassed Mrs Jean Kelvey ( 80) on September 11th 2014 by telephone. The charge was denied by Kavanagh Smith and a jury was sworn in to hear the case before Judge Cormac Quinn.
The jury of eight women and four men were sworn in to hear the case but were sent home on the opening day as legal argument in their absence took place.
In his opening address to the jury, Mr Patrick Reynolds BL ( with State Solicitor Mr Hugh Sheridan) outlined how the accused was the partner of Mrs Kelvey’s son and she lived in County Donegal.
It would be alleged that on September 11th 2014 the accused rang her on a number of occasions over a short period of time informing her that her son was undergoing surgery at Sligo Regional Hospital and ultimately that he had died there.
Legal argument in the absence of the jury then took place with Mr Joe Barnes BL with Mr Gerard McGovern, solicitor ( defending) contesting the admissability of Mrs Kelvey’s evidence.
Case law on oral identification evidence was opened by Mr Barnes though at the outset Mr Quigley said the case was not about voice identification but about voice recognition.
In the absence of the jury, Mrs Kelvey gave evidence that she had travelled to Sligo on getting the calls allegedly from the accused. She insisted that she recognised the voice as the accused.
However, Mr Barnes stressed that the accused was denying he made the calls and in fact had nominated someone else as the person who made the calls, this person having mimicked his voice.
Giving judgement on the second day of the case, Judge Quinn said he was acceding to the defence submission and would be excluding the voice recognition evidence.
At the conclusion of the judgement Mr Quigley said he would not be offering any evidence in the matter.
The jury was called and they were formally discharged by Judge Quinn having been told the prosecution was entering a nolle prosequi in the case.