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RT\u00c9<\/p>\nRT\u00c9<\/p>\n
Emma Costello McCrory was found dead at her home in December 2022<\/p>\n
A man has been sentenced to life in prison for the murder of a mother-of-two in north Dublin.<\/p>\n
George Turner, 56, from Fairview Avenue in the city, pleaded guilty to the murder, earlier this week.<\/p>\n
Emma Costello McCrory, who was 45, was found dead at her home on Howth Road, Clontarf, on 15 December 2022, after a house fire.<\/p>\n
A detective garda gave evidence that Turner had been in a relationship with Ms Costello McCrory for about three months prior to the murder.<\/p>\n
He told the court she had asked Turner to go to the shops to buy alcohol and had asked him to take money out using her cash card. <\/p>\n
He also went to a bookmaker’s before returning to the house in Clontarf.<\/p>\n
Turner told garda\u00ed (Irish police) that he saw smoke coming from the building and had knocked on neighbours’ doors for help.<\/p>\n
However, prosecuting counsel said Turner had set the fire some time after his return to the house and only drew attention to it when smoke started billowing. <\/p>\n
The garda detective agreed that although Turner had a phone, he did not use it to call emergency services.<\/p>\n
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RT\u00c9<\/p>\n
The court heard George Turner had been in a relationship with Ms Costello McCrory for about three months prior to the murder<\/p>\n
‘Sleepy and vulnerable’<\/p>\n
Ms Costello McCrory’s body was found in an upstairs bedroom, Irish broadcaster RT\u00c9 reported. <\/p>\n
The court heard efforts to resuscitate her at the scene failed. <\/p>\n
A post-mortem examination found she had died due to inhaling carbon monoxide and other noxious gases released in the fire. <\/p>\n
Ms Costello McCrory had alcohol and prescription drugs in her blood, which the court heard would have made her sleepy and vulnerable when the fire started.<\/p>\n
Fire services found no evidence of an accelerant and found the fire had started towards the bottom of the victim’s bed.<\/p>\n
Turner made a statement in January 2023 and speculated that the cause of the fire might have been a cigarette.<\/p>\n
However, two months later, he told an acquaintance that he had “burnt Emma” and set a blanket on fire “to take her out of her pain”.<\/p>\n
Turner later told gardai he could not live with himself and that he had started the fire. <\/p>\n
He said he had set Ms Costello McCrory’s bedclothes alight and left when they began to smoulder.<\/p>\n
Tribute to ‘wonderful woman’<\/p>\n
Turner claimed the victim had no quality of life and that she did not want to live. <\/p>\n
He later told garda\u00ed he had not intended to kill her.<\/p>\n
The court heard he continued to use Ms Costello McCrory’s cash card for up to 10 days after the fire for his own personal expenditure. <\/p>\n
The court was also told Turner had difficulties with his own mental health.<\/p>\n
RTE reported that Turner has 42 convictions, mostly for public order and road traffic offences. <\/p>\n
In 2016, he was jailed for four years for possessing firearms and ammunition in suspicious circumstances and was also convicted of possessing drugs for sale or supply.<\/p>\n
Ms Costello McCrory’s mother, Pauline Costello, told the court she was heartbroken.<\/p>\n
She said her only daughter was a “wonderful woman” and “a very caring individual”. <\/p>\n
Ms Costello said her daughter had been diagnosed with cancer when she was studying for a degree in England aged 19. <\/p>\n
She said she recovered and finished her degree and got on with life.<\/p>\n
Ms Costello said her daughter was “very vulnerable” when she met Turner.<\/p>\n
A defence lawyer said Turner wanted to express his remorse and regret for his actions. <\/p>\n
He highlighted his client’s unprompted admissions and confessions in March 2023, followed by his guilty plea.<\/p>\n
Ms Justice Eileen Creedon extended her sympathies to Ms Costello McCrory’s family and said she had died in “needless and tragic circumstances”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RT\u00c9 Emma Costello McCrory was found dead at her home in December 2022 A man has been sentenced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64667,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-73096","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73096\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}