AN INTELLIGENCE ANALYST has told the Special Criminal Court that phone records give no “clear opportunity” for Jonathan Dowdall to have met Gerard ‘The Monk’ Hutch on one of the dates the ex-Sinn Féin councillor proposed the accused “confessed” his direct involvement in the murder of David Byrne.

However, phone analyst Sarah Skedd, who is to be one of the State’s final witnesses, said today, it is possible that “this meeting” in a Dublin park took place on the previous day – Sunday February 7, 2016 – as call records for Dowdall’s phone show that a cell located on Collins Avenue in Whitehall “oriented in such a direction as to potentially give coverage to the park” was used at 3.16pm.

During his lengthy cross-examination, Dowdall told the court that the meeting took place on either February 7 or February 8 and that he was not “a hundred percent sure which day it was”.

Ms Skedd said that none of the phone numbers that contacted Dowdall’s phone [on Sunday February 7] stood out as having potentially been used by Gerard Hutch but it was possible that contact took place over internet based applications.

Gerard Hutch (59), last of The Paddocks, Clontarf, Dublin 3, denies the murder of Kinahan Cartel member David Byrne (33) during a boxing weigh-in at the Regency Hotel on February 5, 2016.

Mr Hutch’s two co-accused – Paul Murphy (61), of Cherry Avenue, Swords, Co Dublin and Jason Bonney (52), of Drumnigh Wood, Portmarnock, Dublin 13 have pleaded not guilty to participating in or contributing to the murder of Mr Byrne by providing access to motor vehicles on February 5, 2016.

Dowdall, a former co-accused of Mr Hutch who has turned State’s witness and who has pleaded guilty to facilitating Mr Byrne’s murder, was on the stand for eight days in December and cross-examined for seven of those by Mr Hutch’s defence counsel Brendan Grehan SC before the Christmas break.

In his direct evidence on December 12, Dowdall testified that Gerard Hutch told him in a park several days after the Regency attack, in or around Monday February 8 2016, that he and another man had shot Mr Byrne at the hotel.

The ex-politician testified that the accused said he “wasn’t happy about shooting the young lad David Byrne and David Byrne being killed”. Asked by prosecution counsel Sean Gillane SC if Mr Hutch had said who had shot Mr Byrne at the Regency Hotel in 2016, Dowdall replied: “He said it was him and ‘Mago’ Gately”.

Mr Grehan told Dowdall in his cross-examination on December 13 that the defence position was the witness had told “two big lies” to the court in his direct evidence, namely that Gerard Hutch had collected keys cards for a room at the Regency Hotel from Dowdall and his father on Richmond Road on February 4, 2016 and that Mr Hutch had “confessed” to him in a park in Whitehall several days later about his direct involvement in the murder of Mr Byrne.

On Dowdall’s seventh and final day under cross-examination last December, the Special Criminal Court heard that an analysis of Dowdall’s phone showed he was travelling towards Dundalk on one of his proposed dates for a meeting with Mr Hutch – when the witness claims Mr Hutch “confessed” his direct involvement in the murder of Mr Byrne – while on the other proposed date his phone pinged off a mast potentially covering the area but “at least three hours” after he claimed he’d met the accused.

On Tuesday of this week under cross-examination, Detective Garda Cathal Connolly, who had interviewed Dowdall, agreed with Mr Grehan that Dowdall had “seemed to nail down” that the meeting in the park took place on the same day Eddie Hutch was murdered on Monday February 8, 2016 and that the meeting took place between 11-12pm on the day.

Ms Skedd, a senior intelligence analyst with An Garda Siochana, gave evidence for a second day today and told prosecuting counsel Fiona Murphy SC that call records for phones associated with Dowdall and his father Patrick confirm that they returned to the Navan Road before going to the Regency Hotel on the evening of February 4, 2016. Dowdall’s phone had used a cell at the Regency Hotel to make a call to Patsy Hutch, she said.

Ms Skedd said Patrick Dowdall’s phone had used a cell on Richmond Road at 7.45pm on February 4 to make a data connection. She said this appeared to be consistent with Dowdall’s account of being on Richmond Road that evening.

In her evidence, Ms Skedd said Dowdall had also made a reference to meeting Gerard Hutch near a park beside a church in Whitehall. She went on to say that Dowdall said he was contacted by Gerard Hutch a few days after the murder of Mr Byrne and after a picture was released by the Sunday World newspaper on Sunday February 7.

The witness said Dowdall maintained the meeting in the park took place around 11.30am and that he had got a call from Patsy’s wife Kay after Eddie Hutch was fatally shot.

Eddie Hutch was shot dead at his north-inner city home on February 8 2016, in what was believed to be a revenge attack for the Regency Hotel shooting three days earlier.

Ms Skedd said the Sunday World picture was released on Sunday February 7 and Eddie Hutch was murdered on Monday February 8. She noted that Dowdall was correct about receiving a call from Patsy’s wife Kay on February 8 and that the only call received on Dowdall’s phone was at 8.03pm on that date, which she said was shortly after the murder of Eddie Hutch.

Having analysed Dowdall’s phone, Ms Skedd said that “based on phone records there does not appear to have been any clear opportunity to go to the park in Whitehall on Monday February 8, 2016″.

She also gave evidence in relation to Sunday February 7 and said “it is possible that this meeting took place on February 7 2016. Call records for Jonathan Dowdall’s phone show that a cell located on Collins Avenue in Whitehall and oriented in such a direction as to potentially give coverage to the park was used at 3.16pm”.

The trial will continue this afternoon before Ms Justice Tara Burns sitting with Judge Sarah Berkeley and Judge Grainne Malone.

Cross-examination

Dowdall agreed with Mr Grehan on his final day of cross-examination that he claimed he had met Gerard Hutch on Monday February 8, 2016, the day Mr Hutch’s brother Eddie ‘Neddy’ Hutch was killed. Dowdall said “it was the Sunday [February 7] or the Monday [February 8], I’m not a hundred percent sure which day it was”.

Mr Grehan put it to Dowdall that he was quizzed by the gardai a number of times about this and that he had actually tied it to the day that Eddie Hutch was killed and had referred to getting a call from Patsy’s wife Kay, who was looking for Patsy, with news of Eddie being killed.

Dowdall said this was correct but that he was not one hundred percent clear, saying: “It was either the Sunday or the Monday. I know the newspaper article was after being released.”

Asked if he would like to have both possibilities of February 7 and February 8, Dowdall said he would. He agreed that his recollection was telling gardai Monday February 8, prior to Eddie Hutch being murdered later that evening, as he got a phone call afterwards. “I just know the newspaper was released. So it was either the Sunday morning or the Monday morning,” he said.

Asked if he was trying to move away from February 8, Dowdall said he wasn’t but that from the day he met gardai he wasn’t “a hundred percent sure whether it was the Sunday morning or the Monday morning”.

Mr Grehan said Dowdall’s phone was examined and showed that the only call from the number saved as Patsy’s wife Kay was on February 8 2016 at 8.03pm, shortly after the murder of Eddie Hutch took place.

Mr Grehan said Sarah Skedd had analysed his phone records and found that there did not appear to have been any clear opportunity to go to the park in Whitehall on February 8 2016. 

When Ms Skedd looked at the possibility that it was the day before, Sunday February 7, Dowdall’s phone pinged off a cell located at Collins Avenue in Whitehall potentially covering the park at 3.16pm, “at least three hours after you claim you met Mr Hutch,” Mr Grehan said.

Dowdall said: “If the time is wrong, the time is wrong. It’s a long, long time ago”.

In summary, Dowdall said: “The meeting happened. The cards were handed over. If I’m a little bit off on the time it’s a long, long time ago. In my mind, it was the morning time and that’s what I believed at the time but the meeting happened.”