Garda murderer Aaron Brady and another man will face trial next year at the Special Criminal Court without a jury, charged with conspiracy to distort the course of justice.
Rady and co-defendant Dean Byrne are charged with conspiracy to convince a state witness not to testify at Brady’s trial for the murder of Detective Garda Adrian Donohoe during a robbery at Lordship Credit Union, Bellurgan, Jenkinstown, Co Louth, on January 25, 2013.
Brady had pleaded not guilty to the murder of the married father of two, but a Central Criminal Court jury found him guilty by majority vote in August 2020 and sentenced him to life imprisonment, which must serve 40 years.
It was the longest murder trial in state history.
Brady (31) of New Road, Crossmaglen, Co Armagh and Dean Byrne (29) of Cabra Park, Phibsborough, Dublin, charged with conspiracy to persuade prosecutor’s witness Daniel Cahill not to testify to disrupt justice between April . June 8, 2020 and June 22, 2020.
However, during the trial, which ran from January to August of that year, Mr Cahill testified that he heard Brady say he had shot a garda.
Brady is also accused of recording the playback of a video of a witness being interviewed by Gardaí, which prompted him to begin a course to distort the course of public justice between February 20, 2020 and May 7, 2020,
During Brady’s 2020 trial, the court was told that the video of Mr Cahill telling gardaí that he admitted to Brady that he killed a garda was circulating on social media.
Judge Michael White described the video’s distribution as “the most outrageous contempt of the court” and a “deliberate attempt to intimidate the witness and others who had to testify”.
It is alleged that a phone was recovered from the cell of co-defendant Mr Byrne in Mountjoy Prison containing five recovered WhatsApp exchanges that contained messages to an anonymous contact with offers to intimidate Dean Cahill.
Today Kate Hanley told BL, on behalf of Brady, at the Special Criminal Court that a trial date would be required.
mr. Justice Tony Hunt, presiding judge of the three-judge court, has set the case for trial on October 2, 2023 and will put the case on November 7 for listing.