The first gardaí on the scene where schoolteacher Ashling Murphy was found unresponsive in undergrowth by the Grand Canal spent ten minutes doing chest compressions, with one officer telling the Central Criminal Court that if he could hear a pulse, “it was very faint”.
Garda Tom Dunne said he arrived at the scene in a patrol car shortly after a distressed call from members of the public.
He told prosecution counsel Anne-Marie Lawlor SC that he saw a body about five or six feet into the ditch down the side of a steep slope from the walkway along the canal.
Ms Murphy lay face up and was wearing a navy jacket, zipped up to her neck. A pair of blue runners and a pink woolly hat lay close to the body. There was a lot of blood in her hair and on the surrounding briars, Garda Dunne said.
He undid her jacket and began doing CPR and chest compressions. Having checked for a pulse he said if he could hear one it was “very faint”. There was only room on the bank for one garda at a time so he took it in turns with a colleague to do chest compressions for about ten minutes.
When paramedics arrived, they took the decision to move Ms Murphy to the walkway but when they found no signs of life they decided to stop working on her body, the garda said.
Jozef Puska (33), with an address at Lynally Grove, Mucklagh, Co Offaly, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Ms Murphy at Cappincur, Tullamore, Co Offaly on January 12th, 2022.
Detective Garda David Scahill also gave evidence this morning, telling Ms Lawlor that he arrived soon after Garda Dunne. He described seeing Ashling on the walkway.
“Her body was limp at that stage. I recall looking at Ashling, her mouth was just wide open and she had a necklace on her that said, “Ashling”,” he said.
The trial is continuing in front of Mr Justice Tony Hunt and a jury of three women and nine men.
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