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Graham Dwyer: Profile of an alleged killer

It has taken 37 days for the prosecution to present its case against Graham Dwyer, who is al...
Newstalk
Newstalk

09.07 14 Mar 2015


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Graham Dwyer: Profile of an al...

Graham Dwyer: Profile of an alleged killer

Newstalk
Newstalk

09.07 14 Mar 2015


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It has taken 37 days for the prosecution to present its case against Graham Dwyer, who is alleged to have stabbed a woman to death for his own sexual gratification.
 
But as the trial draws to a close, just who is the man accused of murdering childcare worker Elaine O'Hara?
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August 19th 2012: Video footage shows Graham Dwyer flying a model aeroplane with his wife and children on family day at Roundwood Model Aeronautical Club.
 
It is a normal snapshot of a man enjoying his hobby on a summer's day, except three days later the woman he is alleged to have murdered vanished after being discharged from St Edmondsbury's psychiatric hospital in Dublin.
 
The last witness who saw her alive was a jogger who gave her directions towards the railway bridge near Shanganagh Cemetery and then saw her walking towards the seaside just before 6pm on August 22nd, 2012.
 
It would be 13 months before a dog walker chanced upon her skeletal remains in a wooded area of Killakee mountain in Rathfarnham.
 
CARS, PLANES AND FAMILY
 
The jury has not heard many details of Graham Dwyer's early life. He was raised in Bandon, Co Cork but has lived in Dublin for years working as a partner at A&D Wejchert architects on Baggot Street with a salary of €87,000 before pay cuts kicked in.
 
He met Gemma, his wife in 1997 while studying architecture at DIT Bolton Street.
 
She gave evidence at his trial last month that they bought and fixed up a cottage in Rathmines and then moved to Kerrymount Close in Foxrock in 2007 where they lived with their two young children.
 
She spoke of juggling work and family commitments and her husband's passion for cars, particularly the Porsche he had once owned which he called his 'baby.'
 
He was also a model aeroplane enthusiast, a hobby he worked on most nights.
 
Gemma Dwyer said her husband 'could do anything' with computers, disliked smoking, and had a tattoo on his left shoulder of a symbol from the Book of Kells which he got before they met.
 
Her description was of a perfectly normal middle-class life that was to be shattered on October 17th 2013.
 
ARREST
 
Just before 7am gardai arrived at Graham Dwyer's door, arresting him on suspicion of murdering Elaine O'Hara. His Foxrock home was searched and items of interest were seized.
 
The court heard the arrest resulted in a 'full blown media frenzy' with an early report stating that the man detained had no previous convictions, information the defense says could only have come from a garda leak.
 
Graham Dwyer was interviewed five times over 24 hours.
 
BDSM
 
He denied on each occasion that he had killed Elaine O'Hara, but in his fourth garda interview he admitted having had BDSM (bondage, discipline, and sadomasochism ) relations with the 36-year-old, evidence of a secret life outside his marriage.
 
He told detectives he had met her through a web site years before. She was deeper into it than me,” he said. “I wanted to keep this from my wife.”
 
He also said that Elaine O'Hara had once asked him to kill her.
 
He later wrote to his wife Gemma admitting that he had not told her the full truth and that he had known that 'awful girl.'
 
To the detectives questioning him, he explained that ‘knife play’ was an aspect of BDSM.
 
He denied cutting anybody, and described the sex games he had had with Elaine as "escapism" and "fantasy."
 
He agreed he had watched erotic horror films the evening before his arrest and said they were ''sort of art to do with horror.”
 
The architect also admitted accessing documents about women being stabbed and strangled on his HTC phone and looking at gore web sites. ''I can't explain. I know it's sick,'' he said.He denied on each occasion that he had killed Elaine O'Hara, but in his fourth garda interview he admitted having had BDSM ( bondage, discipline, and sadomasochism ) relations with the 36-year-old, evidence of a secret life outside his marriage.
 
When detectives asked him about claims from an ex-girlfriend Emer McShea that he was into stabbing, he replied that there was a lot of hatred there.
 
'KILLING DARCI'
 
Earlier this week, members of the public were asked to leave court on three occasions as the prosecution called evidence of a "difficult nature."
 
The jury heard documents entitled 'Killing Darci' and 'Jenny's First Rape' were found on a hard drive in Graham Dwyer’s home.
Sean Guerin SC, prosecuting, read both to the court.
 
The former is a story about killing an American woman and having sex with her corpse. The latter describes a man abducting a woman at knife point from a bookshop in Newcastle and raping her in a hotel room.
 
There were also videos which appear to show Graham Dwyer stabbing Elaine O'Hara during sex while she screamed. In another video the architect talks to a camera about knocking himself out with chloroform.
 
Detective Garda Sergeant Peter Woods gave evidence of another video, not shown in court, in which he identified Graham Dwyer kneeling behind Elaine O'Hara and placing a plastic bag over her head.
 
MASTER AND SLAVE
A key strand of the prosecution's case against Graham Dwyer is the more than 2,600 text messages recovered from Elaine O'Hara's iPhone and 3 secret phones allegedly used by the pair.
 
These include two unregistered Nokia phones recovered from Vartry reservoir in September 2013 along with bondage gear and what the jury heard were the 36-year-old's keys and glasses.
 
These mobiles have been called the 'master' and 'slave' phones because they only had each other's numbers saved in the contacts under the names 'mstr' and 'slv.'
 
The texts recovered from these phones date from August 14th to August 22nd 2012 and make numerous references to rape and stabbing.
 
Elaine O'Hara, who had a long history of mental health issues was a psychiatric in-patient at the time.
 
The master texted the slave that she must be punished for trying to kill herself without him.
 
I’m going to get blood on my knife for this, a lot of blood,” he wrote. The slave replied that she was "scared" and wanted "to try have a normal life."
 
"IT'S NOT ME"
 
On the day before Elaine O'Hara's disappearance the slave phone received a text that she was to be stabbed in a "very remote place," bound to a tree.
 
The master phone sent a message just after 5pm that he was going to the spot to double-check it.
 
Sarah Skedd, a crime analyst gave evidence that the master phone had accessed a cell site close to Graham Dwyer's work place to send that message.
 
She said at around 6.20pm Graham Dwyer's work phone used a cell site at Edmondstown Golf Course with coverage extending to Killakee.
 
On the day of the killing, the slave phone received texts with instructions to park at Shanganagh cemetery at 5.30pm and go to the shore.
 
During garda interviews detectives read the contents of some of these messages to Graham Dwyer, who insisted "it's not me."
 
They showed him one of the phones recovered from the reservoir 13 months after the alleged murder and said, How stupid of you. You thought you’d done the perfect crime.”
 
That’s not my phone,” he replied.
 
The prosecution evidence has now concluded. Next Wednesday the case resumes and it will become apparent if the defense plans on calling any witnesses.
 
Not long after that the final verdict will be in the hands of the jury.

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