A key prosecution witness in the Ennis conspiracy to murder trial has denied she is a fraudster who agreed to give evidence as part of a plea bargain with US authorities.
Teresa Engle, who is awaiting sentence in the US after pleading guilty to extortion, said she agreed to give evidence in Ireland against the advice of her own lawyer.
She has been granted immunity from prosecution in Ireland.
Ms Engle is the former partner of Essam Eid who is on trial for conspiracy to murder.
52-year-old Essam Eid, a poker dealer with an address in Las Vegas and 45-year-old Sharon Collins from Clare deny conspiring to murder Ennis businessman PJ Howard and his sons Robert and Niall between 1 August and 26 September 2006.
The prosecution claims Ms Collins hired Mr Eid through a hit man for hire website to kill her partner and his two sons.
In cross-examination Ms Engle denied that she was a fraudster who was an equal partner in an extortion business in the US.
She denied that the case to which she pleaded guilty to in the US bore similarities to the Irish case.
She said she had never met Ms Collins but said she had seen emails sent to Mr Eid's hitman for hire website.
Ms Engle said she did not know that her evidence in this trial would directly affect what sentence she receives in the US.
She admitted telling 'a string of lies' to gardaí when she was first arrested in Ennis.
It was suggested to her that she had scammed her way out of Ennis Garda station by either telling lies or staying silent and was on a plane home within days.
Ms Engle said she was at all times under the complete control of Mr Eid.
It was also suggested that her performance in the witness box here, if it satisfies the US authorities, would mean she would get little or no sentence.
