A lone gunman walked into a boxing club and fired nine shots with “no warning”, killing one man and injuring two others, a court heard yesterday.
Gerard Cervi is charged with murdering Bobby Messett, 50, at Bray Boxing Club, Bray, Co Wicklow, on June 5, 2018.
Cervi, who has an address of East Wall in Dublin 3, is also charged with the attempted murder of well-known boxing trainer Pete Taylor and Ian Britton.
Pete Taylor is father of world champion boxer Katie Taylor.
Yesterday at the Criminal Courts of Justice, a jury of nine women and three men were sworn in and Mr Paul Murray, Senior Counsel, for the prosecution opened the case.
He told the jurors that on the day in question there was an exercise class underway with 12 people.
Pete Taylor was coaching the class while 11 others, including Mr Messett and Mr Britton, were in attendance.
Mr Murray told the court that just before 7am with “nothing said” and “no warning” a lone gunman entered and fired from a type of semi-automatic pistol in varying directions in quick succession. The court heard that Mr Messett was shot in the head and Mr Taylor and Mr Britton also had gunshot injuries but survived.
The prosecutor said: “The issue you have to decide is if the gunman was Mr Cervi and you will on top of that have to decide the three charges against him.” Mr Murray told the jurors that motive does not have to be proven but intention is “paramount”.
The prosecution asked what are the likely consequences of firing nine bullets in various directions in an enclosed space with 12 people present.
And he posed the question to the jury, what are the probable consequences of firing a bullet at Mr Messett’s head and of shooting into the bodies of Mr Taylor and Mr Britton.
He added that the fact the two injured victims survived the attack does not mean the charge of attempted murder cannot be brought.
Mr Murray described the case as three mini trials in one – the murder of Messett, attempted murder of Taylor and attempted murder or Britton.
Earlier when Mr Cervi had the three charges read to him, he replied, “not guilty.”
The judge asked the jurors to not pay attention or use social media or Google during the trial.
The case is expected to last eight weeks.
