Jury in Deirdre Morley trial to continue deliberations tomorrow

The jurors in the trial of Deirdre Morley, who is accused of the murder of her three children, will continue their deliberations tomorrow.

Ms Morley has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to the murders of nine year old Conor, seven year old Darragh and three year old Carla McGinley on 24 January 2020.

Mr Justice Paul Coffey said in this sad and tragic case there was no contest about what the correct verdict should be. He said the evidence was all one way.

He said the prosecution and defence agreed the defence of insanity applied.

Mr Justice Coffey told the jurors it was up to them to decide if there was any fact that threw doubt on the expert medical evidence, but he said it seemed to him that no such fact had been identified by the prosecution.

The jury foreman asked the judge if they had to bring in the same verdict in the case of all three children.

They also asked for more clarity about the criteria that must be fulfilled for an insanity verdict.

After considering their verdict for an hour and a half, they told the judge they wanted to resume their deliberations tomorrow.

Earlier, Defence counsel, Michael Bowman, in a short address to the jurors told them the overwhelming evidence in the case was in accordance with the psychiatric evidence.

He said both psychiatrists who gave evidence were in agreement that Ms Morley met the criteria for a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity.

Mr Bowman said he suggested this was the only verdict that was in accordance with the oath the jurors had taken and that was appropriate in this case.

The case was a tragedy of enormous proportions, he said, and had at its core the tragic loss of three young children's lives.

He said the loss and pain for all those who loved the three children was unimaginable and unbearable.

Ms Morley had committed her entire professional life to the care and well-being of children as a paediatric nurse and had suffered from depression and anxiety since her student years, he said.

Despite the best efforts of those around her, he said this was not enough to prevent her slipping into a state of delusion and psychosis in January 2020 from which she could not return.

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Earlier a consultant forensic psychiatrist has told the Central Criminal Court that a woman who suffocated her three children believed at the time that her actions were "morally right".

Deirdre Morley, 44, has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to the murder of nine-year-old Conor, seven-year-old Darragh and three-year-old Carla McGinley at their home on 24 January last year.

The court heard she was suffering from a severe, psychotic depressive illness at the time.

Dr Brenda Wright, a consultant forensic psychiatrist from the Central Mental Hospital, gave evidence on behalf of Deirdre Morley to the court.

She said a review of her records showed she had a long history of struggles with mental health.

This had evolved into a depressive illness, which became more severe and psychotic as time went on.

She diagnosed her with a bipolar affected disorder, otherwise known as a manic depressive disorder.

Dr Wright said Ms Morley first became seriously depressed in late 2018. This was also the first time the recurring theme of the effect her mental health was having on her children began to emerge in her medical records.

Her condition significantly worsened in July 2019, when she was admitted to St Patrick's hospital for four weeks. But after some improvement she began deteriorating again towards the end of that year.

Dr Wright said in the year leading up to the incident, the words "worthlessness" and "guilt" were repeatedly recorded in Ms Morley's notes.

These, she said, were red flags for an emerging psychotic illness. Ms Morley had severe depression which became seriously distressing and unmanageable and interfered with her functioning at home, at work and socially.

The doctor said Ms Morley was experiencing delusions which were not amenable to reason. Although she was repeatedly reassured about her parenting and about the children, she could not take these reassurances on board.

In January 2020 Dr Wright said Ms Morley's depression became more severe, and her thinking increasingly dominated by hopelessness, helplessness, and a sense that life was unbearable.

Her delusions became more fixed and not amenable to reason. She came to believe the implementation of her plan to kill her children and herself was necessary and urgent and could not identify an alternative.

She told Dr Wright that she first began thinking of killing her children three or four days before she put her plan into effect. She said she could not not take them with her. And she also felt she had ruined them by bad parenting and mental illness. She felt they were doomed and had lost all hope for herself and her children.

Dr Wright said at the time the three children were suffocated, Ms Morley knew what she was doing would result in the deaths of her children but did not know her actions were wrong.

The doctor told the court Ms Morley harboured a psychotic moral justification for her actions. She believed her actions were morally right as she believed she had irreparably damaged her children and had to put an end to their suffering.

The doctor said it was her view that Ms Morley was unable to refrain from her actions as a result of her depressive psychosis. She said Ms Morley's thinking and judgment were impaired and she was unable to generate an alternative to the catastrophic acts of killing Conor, Darragh and Carla.

Afterwards, Ms Morley made an attempt to end her own life and was placed in a coma at Tallaght hospital.

When she woke up, she was psychiatrically assessed and doctors reported that she repeatedly expressed remorse for what had happened.

She told psychiatrists she should have waited for her husband to come home and should have admitted herself somewhere.

The doctors noted that she had "remarkably nihilistic" beliefs about the effect her mental illness had had on her children.

Ms Morley told the doctors she wasn't supposed to be there and that she wished she could go back in time. She said she felt her children were so damaged, she didn't think they had any other options.

A second consultant psychiatrist who gave evidence this afternoon also found that Ms Morley suffered from a mental disorder when she killed her children.

Dr Mary Davoren said at the time that Ms Morley was suffering from a severe depressive disorder.

She said she knew she was killing her children but the severity of her depression impaired her ability to appreciate that what she was doing was wrong.

Dr Davoren also said that on the day the children died, Ms Morley lacked the ability to refrain from committing the acts due to the nature of the symptoms she was suffering.

Both consultant psychiatrists agreed that Ms Morley reaches the criteria in the legislation whereby a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity can be reached.

Earlier, Dr Davoren said that in interviews with Ms Morley, she described thinking a few days before she suffocated the children that they would all "have to go". She said she considered what if she survived and had to spend her whole life in prison, but still thought it had to be done.

Ms Morley told Dr Davoren that this showed her thinking was warped or deluded. She said she was so on her knees, that she was not capable of giving the children what they needed.

She said she could not envisage a future except illness and was worried about issues like Conor not being able to ride a bike, Darragh not being able to swim and Carla not being toilet trained.

She had considered not suffocating Conor and thought about dropping him over to someone he would be safe with so he could be collected by his father, but then she thought things had gone too far, and she smothered him also.

Ms Morley said she felt she would never get over her state of depression now that she had lost her kids.

She told doctors in the aftermath of the tragedy that she had lots of support and wishes she had reached out to her husband or other family members.

Dr Davoren said Ms Morley’s mental state was difficult to assess accurately as it could change rapidly, but she said Ms Morley had admitted that at times she had masked her symptoms and those around her may not have known how low her mood really was.

In her last interview with her in April this year, Dr Davoren said she was neatly dressed, with normal eye contact and speech with no thoughts of harm to herself or others.

Ms Morley said she wanted to move forward to escorted community release after the trial was over.