'We say what happened was murder': Prosecution closes its case in Cork trial 

Day 13 of the trial of three people accused of murdering 44-year-old postman Barry Daly in Doneraile on a night when the town was celebrating a big success in a hurling championship final saw the prosecution close its case.

Once senior counsel Lorcan Staines indicated that the prosecution had presented all of its evidence in the trial, the jury of seven women and five men was sent home by Ms Justice Siobhán Lankford for legal discussions in their absence.

When the jurors return at 11am tomorrow the defendants will have the option to call witnesses and go into evidence. 

However, in any criminal trial there is no onus on the defence to give any evidence.

“We say the three accused were acting as a team,” prosecution senior counsel Lorcan Staines said in his opening speech in the case at the Central Criminal Court sitting in Cork.

Alex Deady (20) of Glenview, Convent Road, Doneraile, County Cork, and two juveniles, aged 16 and 17, who cannot be named for legal reasons, are on trial at the Central Criminal Court on the charge of murdering Barry Daly at Rockview Terrace in Doneraile on October 12, 2025. 

Alex Deady and the 17-year-old pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter. The 16-year-old simply pleaded not guilty to murder. The ages relate to the date of the incident.

Mr Staines said: “We say they went there together to cause – at a minimum – serious injury. We say what happened was murder.” 

Assistant State Pathologist Dr Margot Bolster said Mr Daly's jaw was broken into fragments and dislocated from where it attaches to the skull on the left side. 

“It caused an awful lot of bleeding that would have been inhaled into the lungs. All of these fractures of your mouth, and blood - you cannot get air into your lungs and without oxygen you die," she said.

“(The deceased’s consumption of ) alcohol and cocaine could have accelerated the death caused by trauma, jaw fractures and bleeding into the lungs." But she said the intoxicants were not a cause of death in themselves.

Memos of garda interviews with the three accused were presented in the case.

Alex Deady told gardaí he arrived with the 17-year-old and that the deceased jumped out and went to strike the teenager. 

Alex Deady told gardaí: “I just swung and he hit the ground. I didn’t go to do it… I didn’t mean it. I had no intention of doing that to him. None… It was just instinct. I just swung.” 

The 17-year-old told gardaí: “We were going up, expecting a fight, to be honest. No intention to kill… There was no plan.” 

The 16-year-old told gardaí throughout his interviews that he did not even leave his home in Doneraile at any time that night.