A computer taken from the home of Mary Lowry, the girlfriend of part-time DJ Bobby Ryan whose body was found in a run off tank at her farm, had been used to search for Mr Ryan's name, the day before his body was found.
Patrick Quirke, 50, from Breanshamore, Co Tipperary, who had previously been in a relationship with Ms Lowry, is on trial for Mr Ryan's murder.
He denies murdering Mr Ryan between 3 June 2011 and 30 April 2013.
Mr Quirke was leasing the farm from Ms Lowry at the time.
Detective Garda Paul Fitzpatrick from the Garda cyber crime unit was cross-examined by Defence Counsel, Bernard Condon.
He agreed with Mr Condon that a computer he examined, which had been taken from Mr Quirke's home, did not have a password on it and he was not in a position to put anyone specific operating it at any particular time.
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
Yesterday, the court heard the computer had been used in early December 2012 to search for material related to the time it takes for the human body to decompose.
In relation to the searches for "human body decomposition timeline" he said he could not say all those words were typed by the person operating the computer.
Some of them could have been entered by predictive text he agreed.
Asked about a search carried out on the computer a few days later about a "red colour scheme" and "what colours with red", Detective Garda Fitzpatrick said he did not know anything about this as he did not see it as relevant to his investigation.
Detective Garda Fitzpatrick said he had carried out an analysis in July 2013 of a computer taken from Ms Lowry's home.
He agreed that at 9.45pm on 29 April 2013, the day before Mr Ryan's body was found, there was a search for the words "trace ireland Bobby Ryan".
Earlier, Detective Garda Fitzpatrick said among the keywords gardaí had asked him to search for on the devices taken from Mr Quirke's home were "vehicular manslaughter" and "road traffic accident".
He said he did not receive any results from these searches. He agreed there was an enormous amount of material on the computer.
He told Mr Condon that in a document prepared for the jury he had said that the user of the computer "may" have visited a certain site in July 2012.
But he had since carried out a further examination using a machine called a "wayback machine" and his opinion now was that the user had visited the site and the word "may" was wrong.
This afternoon, a social worker told the Court that Patrick Quirke contacted her in February 2011 expressing concern about Mary Lowry's children and alleging they were being left alone for long periods of time.
Deirdre Caverley is now based in Boston, but was a duty social worker based in Clonmel in February 2011.
In her evidence via videolink from the US, she told the court she received a call on February 4th 2011, from Patrick Quirke.
He alleged Mary Lowry would leave her family home at the weekends from 4pm until the early hours of the morning, leaving her three children alone and unsupervised.
At the time of the call, he said the situation had been going on for about three months.
Ms Caverley said Mr Quirke told her Ms Lowry had recently entered into a new relationship and was spending time with her new boyfriend at the weekends.
He said she had been widowed for about three and a half years and he felt she had "lost the run of herself and had become fixated on this relationship".
She said Mr Quirke added that Ms Lowry was failing to take into account the emotional needs of her three children due to her new relationship.
He told her that the children's grandmother who lived in a granny flat attached to the Lowry family home was not asked to look after the children when they were being left alone and he said the grandmother shared his concerns.
Ms Caverley said she advised him that if there were any immediate concerns about the children at the weekend, he should alert gardaí.
She told Mr Quirke she would open an assessment into the concerns and would meet with Mary Lowry.
She said she made an unannounced visit to the home on February 10th but neither Ms Lowry nor the children were there.
She contacted Mr Quirke by phone and he advised her that 4pm would be a good time to return.
Ms Caverley said a colleague conducted a second home visit.
Ms Caverley said she didn't speak to the children's grandmother and was not directed by Mr Quirke to anyone else.
She said she took no further complaints from Mr Quirke or anyone else about the matter.
The jury have now been sent home for the evening. Ms Justice Eileen Creedon told them the evidence in the case would finish "during next week".
