Son accused of stabbing his mum 10 times and beating her

A WOMAN who was allegedly stabbed by her son, took a ring from her finger as she lay dying and asked a witness to give it to her second son.

Ann Henry died outside her home at The Spinney, Abbeytown, Roscommon on September 17, 2011 and her son Paul Henry is on trial for murder.

It is alleged he stabbed his mother 10 times with a kitchen knife and afterwards kicked her and beat her with a brush handle until it broke as she lay seriously injured on the ground.

Judge Paul Carney and a jury heard that the reason Henry attacked his 47 year-old mother was because he did not like her suggestion as to where he should live.

The court heard how Mrs Henry, who was estranged from her husband, primary school headmaster Phelim Snr, ‘stumbled’ from her home after being stabbed in her kitchen.

Opening the case for the prosecution yesterday, Una Ní Raifeartaigh, counsel for the DPP, said that Henry had been involuntarily detained against his will in a mental hospital for a number of weeks prior to the incident in which his mother died.

Counsel said that the accused and his mother had been cleaning her house when “a row of sorts” developed and he took a kitchen knife and stabbed her.

Ms Ni Raifeartaigh quoted the witness statement of Tom Greally who said he knelt down beside Mrs Henry who called out to him: “Tom, Tom come here, I've been stabbed”.

She then took a ring from her hand and asked her to give it to another son, Phelim Junior.

The Central Criminal Court, sitting in Castlebar, Co Mayo, heard how one witness said Henry “looked angry”.

“He looked like he was looking through me. His pupils were huge.”

Ms Ní Raifeartaigh continued: “Neighbours said she got pushed and kicked to the ground by her son.

“He kicked her repeatedly on the ground. People shouted at him to stop. He took a brush handle and beat her with that.”

 Counsel explained that a gardai restrained Paul Henry and took him away in a patrol car.

“She was dead by the time she got to hospital,” Ms Ni Raifeartaigh told the jury of six men and six women.

The accused had shown signs of mental difficulties from an early stage. He took to drinking and his parents had difficulties trying to manage him, the court was told.

Source-Irish Independent