Man found guilty of murder after fatally stabbing love triangle rival

During the trial, the jury heard that Connorton was living with his long-term partner Claire McGrath at Deerpark Avenue but after an argument she invited Mr McKeever to spend the night with her.

When Connorton returned home at 4am, he found the two of them together and a fight broke out that resulted in Mr McKeever suffering four stab wounds including one that penetrated his heart and killed him.

The accused said he acted in self-defence after Mr McKeever punched him, breaking his eye socket, and then came at him with a knife.

After deliberating for about two hours and 51 minutes the jury of nine men and three women came back to court and asked if they could be allowed to return a majority verdict.

Justice Tony Hunt told them that a verdict could be returned if ten of them agreed. About ten minutes later they returned to reveal their verdict of guilty of murder by a ten to two majority.

Connorton will be sentenced to life imprisonment at a later sitting when his victim's family will have an opportunity to make a statement to the court about the impact his death has had on their lives.

Connorton showed little reaction following the verdict while members of Mr McKeever's family hugged and comforted one another.

Justice Hunt thanked the jury for their "commitment and attention" in what he said was a difficult matter.

He said it was made all the more tragic because nobody set out on that day with "anything like this in mind, but it happened." He said the difficulty of their task was etched on their faces before exempting them from jury service for 12 years and wishing them a happy Christmas.

Addressing Mr Connorton's legal team Justice Hunt commented: "Lumping all these cases into the one category is extremely unfair and unjust."

A 'bumpy' relationship

In his garda interviews, Keith Connorton said he met Claire McGrath at a Luas stop where she was crying after breaking up with her boyfriend. He consoled her and they struck up a bond that became a relationship.

He loved her "to bits", he said, and when she became pregnant they were determined to kick their addictions to heroin.

But their relationship was described as "bumpy". They frequently argued as Ms McGrath was often suspicious that Connorton was back using heroin.

She described herself as volatile and said their frequent arguments would end with Connorton leaving the apartment to allow her to calm down.

On the Tuesday, three days before Mr McKeever was stabbed, there was another argument and Connorton left.

Defence counsel Michael O'Higgins SC said this argument was different to previous ones because on this occasion Ms McGrath wanted to finish with Connorton to clear the way for Mr McKeever to spend the night with her.

She sent Mr McKeever a number of messages in those three days inviting him over and telling him she loved him and wanted his arms wrapped around her.

On that Friday afternoon or evening, Mr McKeever called and they had a few drinks and watched television.

They were in bed together when, at about 4am, Connorton returned. Giving her evidence Ms McGrath became upset as she revealed that the accused had a key to the patio door.

"I don't know why I thought he wouldn't come back. He always does," she said, adding: "It was just a bad lapse of judgment."

When she heard Connorton, she ran to the kitchen and told him to leave, that their relationship was finished.

In his statements to gardai, Connorton said he was "devastated" by this. He didn't think they had split up and told her the apartment was his, he paid the rent.

Then he realised there was someone in the bedroom.

He said: "That's when things started getting messy."

He hit her across the face and asked who was "in our bed, in my bed". She told him to get out.

"Then this big young fella comes out half-naked and clocks me," Connorton told gardai.

Over 40 injuries detected by Deputy State Pathologist

The accused told gardai that he thinks he "blacked out" and that Mr McKeever must have hit him a "load of times" as he had "lumps" all over him.

A doctor's report showed that he had suffered a fracture to the bone around his eye. The next thing he said he could remember was Ms McGrath screaming at Mr McKeever to "put down the knife".

Mr McKeever, he said, came at him but the accused got up and grabbed the knife by the blade, cutting his own hand.

The jury was shown a photograph of this deep gash. Despite the wound, he said he didn't feel the pain and managed to turn the knife around and stab Mr McKeever "a couple of times".

He got the knife off Mr McKeever and said he thinks he may have stabbed him again. Prosecution counsel Brendan Grehan SC described this account as a "pack of lies".

He pointed to the evidence of Deputy State Pathologist Dr Linda Mulligan who found four stab wounds to Mr McKeever's torso, one of which penetrated the heart and caused his death.

She found about 40 other injuries including ten to the arms, torso and legs that she said were consistent with being "swiped" by the tip of a pointed blade.

Further scrape injuries, she said, were consistent with a serrated blade. Gardai found a pointed and serrated knife at the scene, both of which had Connorton's blood on them but not the deceased's.

Ms McGrath gave different accounts of the fight. In her original statements to gardai she said Connorton picked up a knife when he realised there was someone else there, threatened to kill her and pushed her.

Mr McKeever, she said, came running into the room after she screamed in fear.

In her evidence to the jury, she said Connorton had a knife in his hand because he was cutting cannabis and she denied that he pushed or threatened her before Mr McKeever ran in and "charged into him like a bull" and "beat the crap out of him".

In her original statement, she said that a fight broke out and Connorton swiped with the knife several times and stabbed Mr McKeever in the chest.

In her direct evidence, she said he had "ample opportunity" to use the knife but held it down by his side while taking punches to the face. She said he then used the knife in a "defensive movement".

Ms McGrath agreed with Mr O'Higgins that her memory of the events was not reliable due to her drug use.

At the time she was using cannabis and taking prescribed Xanax and sleeping pills.

Connorton: All I want is a 'happy wee family'

Mr O'Higgins, in his closing speech, said she lied in her direct evidence and asked the jury to consider that if she could lie to them she could have lied to gardai in February 2017 when she said the accused retrieved a knife and threatened her when he realised there was another man in his bed.

He pointed out that she had said she hated the accused at the time and the messages she sent to Mr McKeever suggested that she was in love with him.

Prosecution counsel Brendan Grehan SC told the jury that they could rely on Ms McGrath's earlier accounts to gardai, which, he said, she agreed were largely true.

She only resiled from them, counsel said, when they were critical of the accused, a man who she is back in a relationship with and who she says she loves.

Justice Tony Hunt told the jury that there were three possible verdicts available to them: guilty, not guilty, or not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter.

They could find him guilty of manslaughter if they found that he was acting in self-defence but used excessive force. Had he been acting in self-defence and used only reasonable force he told the jury to acquit.

If he was not acting in self-defence and intended to kill or cause serious injury when he inflicted the wounds then the appropriate verdict would be murder.

Ms McGrath and Connorton have made up since the events of February 2017 and are once again in a relationship, she said during the trial.

She visits him regularly in prison. During his interviews with gardai, Connorton said that all he wanted was a "happy wee family" with Ms McGrath and his son.

"Now that's all ruined," he added