A 27-year-old man has been found not guilty of murder but guilty of the manslaughter of another man whose body was found in the boot of his own car last year.
Stephen Penrose, of no fixed abode, had admitted killing David Sharkey but denied murder.
David Sharkey, 28, a father of one, was stabbed 13 times while delivering heroin to an apartment at Black Castle in Navan, Co Meath, on 17 May last year.
Penrose said he and his friend had planned to rob him, not to kill him. But he said he panicked when David Sharkey pulled a knife on him to stop him escaping with the drugs.
After he killed him, he put the body in the boot of the victim's car and left it at Dunsink Lane in Finglas in north Dublin.
He said at the time he had been smoking heroin and it had taken over his life.
However the prosecution said it was not a panicked attack, but a well-hatched plan.
Penrose had bought a knife earlier in the day. The prosecution said it was not a terrible mistake, as he claimed, and there was more to it.
It was not out of desperation for drugs, he had enough money to feed his habit for at least a week, the prosecution said. They also questioned why Penrose had claimed there was a struggle but he had no wounds while his victim had 13 knife wounds.
His defence lawyer said it defied logic to say it was a premeditated killing. It happened in broad daylight in a busy area and Penrose had confessed the killing long before he knew there was CCTV footage of him putting the body in the boot.
After nearly six hours of deliberation, the jury found him not guilty of murder but guilty of manslaughter by a ten to two majority.
He will be sentenced on 5 July.
