The Court of Appeal has dismissed Adam O’Keeffe’s appeal against his murder conviction, ruling that the trial judge did not err by failing to address intoxication in her direction on provocation.
The ex tempore judgment was delivered by Ní Raifeartaigh J. on 28 July 2021. The appeal concerned the jury directions at O’Keeffe’s trial, not a fresh determination of the evidence or verdict. His conviction for murder and life sentence, which ran from 6 December 2017, remained in place.
The prosecution case at trial was that O’Keeffe and Amy McCarthy were together in Cork on 29 and 30 April 2017. CCTV showed a heated argument between them, and a witness gave evidence about the pair. McCarthy was last seen entering premises described in the judgment as a squat at about 7.10pm on 29 April. She was found dead the following day. A post-mortem attributed her death to multiple injuries, including blunt force trauma to the head and asphyxia associated with manual strangulation, complicated by acute alcohol intoxication.
O’Keeffe pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter. At trial he relied on provocation and on lack of intent because of intoxication. The jury convicted him of murder.
On appeal, O’Keeffe argued that the trial judge should have explained how intoxication related to provocation. The issue had been raised in a requisition during the trial, but both sides’ requisitions were later withdrawn. The Director of Public Prosecutions argued that intoxication and intent were distinct from provocation, and that the judge had dealt with intoxication separately. The Director also argued that withdrawing the requisition prevented the issue being raised on appeal.
The appeal court said later Supreme Court judgments in DPP v McNamara and DPP v Almasi had addressed the relationship between intoxication and provocation. Although the relevant comments were obiter, the court said they carried significant weight and supported the Director’s position. It concluded that the trial judge’s failure to address intoxication within the provocation direction was not an error. The appellant’s argument about whether the issue could be raised despite the withdrawn requisition therefore became moot.
The court dismissed the appeal. It did not reconsider the jury’s verdict or alter the sentence.