Jozef Puska guilty of murder of Ashling Murphy (Mod notes and threadbans in op)

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346491#Comment_121346491

He did though. Except then he changed his mind.

he literally is on record as telling Gardai from a hospital bed that he “did it”, meaning he killed ashling. He’s just a pathetic liar who thought he could make up stories and walk away scot free.

despite the mandatory life sentence there’s really no mitigation in this case either he not only spent the last several weeks lying blatantly, after attacking and murdering her, he hid and stabbed himself in the stomach to fabricate the story he was attacked by a masked man.

Insidious and disgusting behaviour and it’s no surprise to read stories that suggest he murdered her on the back of a Tusla referral against him. It’s fairly evident imo that the murder was pre mediated given the attempts to deceive the Gardai and people in general that he was in fact a victim himself.

Takes a special sort of head case I think to stab yourself in order to hide from a crime.

Geuze

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346773#Comment_121346773

"He came to Ireland in 2013, first to Dublin, he told gardaí, before moving to Tullamore with his partner and three children. They had two more children after moving to Tullamore, he said.

He lived in a five bedroom house in Mucklagh, he said, with just his partner and children.

Asked by gardaí how he supported his family, Mr Puska said he was working until he suffered a slipped disc, and was now in receipt of a disability pension."

I suspect they mean Invalidity Pension here.

Is it possible to cycle with a slipped disc?

How did he manage to pay for a five bedroom house?

Esho

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346560#Comment_121346560

Out in 10+ if he keeps his nose clean.

Should enjoy his time with his ethnic brothers in prison.

Strazdas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346803#Comment_121346803

Also, some lawyers specialise in mounting defence cases. There is nothing to say that the person they are defending has to be innocent.

TooTired123

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346491#Comment_121346491

He and his family clearly considered themselves to have a far superior intellect than the idiots in the justice system.

As ever, it’s just a question of making up a pretty plausible story and sticking to it. The special part of his story was that he was in actual fact the hero of the hour, trying to save Ms Murphys life after she’d been attacked by the mysterious masked man.

Photobox

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346809#Comment_121346809

Yes he was well capable of killing somebody. Guessing it was social housing. The word scum gets bandied about here a lot, well justified in this case. Hope he rots.

cheese sandwich

Mr Justice Hunt told the jury he agreed with their decision and was glad they didn’t spend any more time than they needed to consider Mr Puska’s “nonsense”.

That was no reflection on Mr Puska’s legal team, he said. “You can’t make bricks without straw and what the lawyers had in their hands was poor stuff indeed,” he said.

“Quite literally, you made sure nobody got away with murder,” the judge said. He exempted the jury from service for 20 years.

He told the jury he had to impose a sentence mandated by law but before that the victim’s family would have an opportunity to provide victim impact statements. He will hear them on November 17th.

There was a lot about Ashling, her GAA top, her being a primary school teacher, that resonated with people, the judge said. To lose a child is unnatural, he said. When a child gets an illness or dies in an accident, parents may be able to reconcile themselves in some way but the position of the Murphy family is unenviable, considering what happened here.

“We have evil in this room, no doubt about that,” he said.

Good man Tony Hunt. A no nonsense judge.

FutureGuy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346757#Comment_121346757

Correct. It is their job. That's not what I am asking.

I am asking how someone who is defending a clearly-guilty scumbag sleep at night knowing what he does for a living could get someone off murdering a young woman in this particular situation.

I'd rather clean toilets with a clear conscience.

StormForce13

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346760#Comment_121346760

A great opportunity for a predatory lawyer to take a case against the State for attempting to deport innocent members of a terrified family who were forced - at knifepoint and against their will - to perform certain actions. The case, plus appeals to every court in the land plus the ECHR will take a decade, by which time the scumbag will probably be out on parole.

walshb

Hopefully good stretch behind bars and in 16-17 years time we don’t read about how some pr1ck of a psychiatrist is advising his release to a parole board. 40 years probably wishful thinking

Tork

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346806#Comment_121346806

I heard that Tusla rumour too but it doesn't add up. Ashling taught in Durrow, which is a country school 12 km from Mucklagh and is out the other side of Tullamore. Why would he send his kids to a school that far away when there are any number of schools en route. Not least, one in Mucklagh itself. He also didn't drive so how would they get there? I think this was a random attack and poor Ashling happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was eying up other women before this, remember?

larko

Exactly my thoughts. GPs signing people off work to go on disability so easily. Ok he cant do construction work but I'm sure there's other work he can do.

5 kids, 5 bedroom house, doesnt drive so gets buses and taxis. Jesus Christ what is going on with our country?

He murders a beautiful, talented, hard working young woman who was out jogging during the day after stalking numerous women in the town. Disabled?

walshb

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346854#Comment_121346854

Same rumor I heard.

TagoMago

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346718#Comment_121346718

I'm no law expert but I'd imagine he would need a defence lawyer to go to trial to get the life sentence he deserved. No defence lawyer, no life sentence

lmao10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346648#Comment_121346648

Have you ever heard of Larry Murphy? Or any other white Irish rapist/murderer? There are quite a few.

HildaOgdenx

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346854#Comment_121346854

Exactly. It makes no sense whatsoever.

And it was stressed more than once in the reporting that there was no connection between them. They were totally unknown to each other. From the reporting during the trial, it seems he had followed more than one potential victim that day.

From a report today:

No motive has been offered for the killing and lawyers in the case stressed that there was no connection between Puska and Ms Murphy.

https://www.rte.ie/news/courts/2023/1109/1415622-jozef-pushka-backgrounder/

Augme

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346841#Comment_121346841

A defence solicitor and barristers job isnt to determine guilt, thats the job of the jury. If a clearly guilty scumbag gets off then it's because the jury determined they are innocent.

Be right back

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346877#Comment_121346877

Larry Murphy was never convicted of murder..Even though.

Tork

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346864#Comment_121346864

Exactly. It was really hard to listen to the bullshit and the lies coming from the Puska side and I was getting a bit nervous because the jury was taking so long. But ultimately, justice has been served. And that creature can't turn around and accuse anybody of not giving him a fair go. He got as robust a defence as he could have in the circumstances. I think that will help seal his fate.

left_hander

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346841#Comment_121346841

But like it or not this is a cornerstone of our justice system. A bit like cleaning the toilet, somebody has to do it.

The man was guilty as sin from day 1 and deserves everything he gets but despite that he is entitled to legal defence. People on Twitter saying he should be jailed for defending him, what do they want everybody suspected of a crime to be just jailed without any right to a fair trial?

Michael Bowman probably knew full well from day 1 his client was guilty, but his job is to ensure a safe conviction by stress testing every scrap of evidence put forward by the prosecution. Anne-Marie Lawlor could be doing it in the next trial. This is just how our legal system works.

The judge said for the past number of weeks that the jury must take emotion out of it and just deal with the evidence as it is presented. This is what both defence and prosecution do all the time. I'd rather this system than the "plea deal" style system which results in a miscarriage of justice for Jason Corbett.

RIP Ashling Murphy, my heart goes out to her family driving home today but at least they got justice for her. I can only imagine what they are going through.

left_hander

Many of the reputable media reporters on Twitter saying there was no truth in the Tusla rumour. I think people shouldn't be speculating about that.

pjordan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346877#Comment_121346877

Yup, not denying that fact that we are unfortunately well capable of cultivating our own home grown monsters without any outside cultural influences.

However, there are, shall we say male members of certain cultures more predisposed towards a certain negative attitude to women, or not brought up within the cultural norms of what is considered acceptable behaviour to women in modern Ireland (and admittedly plenty of Irish males incapable of adhering to these norms of behaviour either).

In a nutshell, if Puska was of gypsy extraction, was his attitude towards Irish woman likely to be more negative/disfunctional, as his behaviour demonstrated on a good number of occasions that day prior to the murder?

hynesie08

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346841#Comment_121346841

Because he did his job, Josef puska received a full and fair trial where he was found guilty and will receive a life sentence.

An attempt to not do his job could have resulted in a mistrial or grounds for an appeal.

I'd sleep fairly handy if that was me.

Gael23

How long does a life sentence actually mean?

walshb

Not sure, but would this murder, arrest, trial and conviction be an example of “swift” justice, as in time to closure pretty fast? 22 months..

ArmaniJeanss

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346841#Comment_121346841

"By actively trying to get a guilty person off by obfuscation or loopholes, you keep the DPP/prosecution/guards honest and force them to properly build a case with all i's dotted and t's crossed, and this filters through to the entire system. This makes it less likely that they'll ever try to or be able to get a guilty verdict against an innocent person. So by putting up a robust defence for a likely guilty person, you are also defending innocent people."

As explained to me by a lawyer friend, paraphrasing a bit.

hynesie08

Are we now allowed talk about the fact that geebag Gemma O'Doherty is claiming he was set up by the gardai?

Shelga

The jury took 2 hours to reach a decision. I’d say approximately 1 hour and 58 minutes of that was them sitting around to drag out the time, until they could call the judge.

Jequ0n

Build a shrine already and move on. As if this is the only person to get murdered.

I’m not surprised by his family’s attitude and behaviour though. People go out of their way to convince themselves of a version that they desperately want to believe in.

TooTired123

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121346841#Comment_121346841

I’m always so disappointed when I hear anyone saying this.

Why would anyone doing the job that they trained, studied, passed very difficult exams to be considered qualified for etc. have any difficulty in “sleeping”?

People have difficulty sleeping if they’ve something weighing on their conscience.

What would the defence team have on their conscience?!?

In order for justice to be delivered, the accused has to have the best defence team he or she could possibly have.

That way, the public at large can be assured that even though the defendant put forward his/her best possible case, the evidence that he was guilty was so overwhelming, the jury still found him/her guilty. So there is no doubt that he/she is guilty.

Thats as clear as a bell to me. I have no idea what your concept of justice is at all.