Murder accused Richard Satchwell replied “guilty or not guilty – guilty” when he was arrested by Irish police investigating the death of his wife, a jury has heard.
The jury in Satchwell’s trial at the Central Criminal Court in Dublin has heard details of his arrest on October 13, 2023, after the remains of his wife, Tina were found under the stairs in the living room of their Co Cork home.
The jury also heard that the murder accused had described his wife as a “street angel, house devil” to an acquaintance the week after she disappeared in 2017.
Satchwell, 58, of Grattan Street in Youghal, is accused of murdering his wife between March 19 and 20, 2017.
He was arrested for the murder of his wife in October 2023, after her body was found in a shallow clandestine grave, six years after he reported her missing.
He denies the charge.
Satchwell, originally from Leicester in England, formally reported his wife missing on May 11 2017.
Giving evidence of Satchwell’s arrest, Detective Garda David Kelleher said that after he arrested him for murder and he was cautioned, Satchwell replied: “Guilty or not guilty, guilty.”
The jury also heard defence barrister Brendan Grehan put it to the detective that gardai had put his client though a “perp walk” to court the morning after his arrest for murder.
A “perp walk” is where a suspect is publicly escorted to court to allow members of the press to photograph the accused.
Mr Grehan said that gardai parked “quite a distance” from Cashel District Court rather than directly in front of the court house, and that there was a large number of media present.
He told the court that gardai were “overcompensating” for their “failure” in the investigation into Mrs Satchwell’s disappearance, who went missing almost seven years previously.
Detective Kelleher said he would not have used the terminology “perp walk”, adding that he was not driving the car which escorted Satchwell to court.
The jury also heard evidence that Mrs Satchwell told a friend that she had “one man, one man only”, at a car boot sale hours before she was allegedly murdered by her husband.
Mrs Satchwell told John Keoghan that she loved her husband “so much” and would never hurt him at the event in Carrigtwohill in Co Cork on March 19, 2017.
He said Mrs Satchwell was a “very nice person” who was well dressed and liked to wear expensive clothes.
He said he knew the victim as he had married a woman who grew up close to where Mrs Satchwell lived.
Mr Keoghan said that on the last day he saw her, she had bought a jacket and perfume and he had joked that she must have been meeting someone that night.
He said Mrs Satchwell had replied that she loved her husband so much and that she would never touch another man.
The following week, on March 26, 2017, he met Satchwell at another car boot sale in Castletownroche.
He claimed that after asking where his wife was, Satchwell told him that Mrs Satchwell was a “street angel, house devil”, alleging that she had been violent, had knocked his teeth out and that she had now left him.
The witness gave evidence that Satchwell told him he had been beat by Mrs Sachwell the previous week.
“I said she wouldn’t hurt a child,” he added.
Dr Deirdre O’Grady, a retired GP whose practice was based in Fermoy, told the court that she never treated Satchwell.
She said that while Mrs Satchwell had attended her practice, Satchwell did not and she had never treated him.
She told the court that she checked paper records from the 1990s until 2001 and then computerised records from 2001 onwards and had no records of a patient matching Satchwell’s name.
Dr O’Grady said he knew of Satchwell when he attended the surgery with his wife, who had attended the practice briefly in the 1990s, for her appointments.
When asked by Mr Grehan whether she could remember being called out to the Satchwell home when Mrs Satchwell was ill, she said she did not.
She also said she had no recollection of Mrs Satchwell telling her that her husband had taken an overdose.
“I would have notes if something as serious as that was brought to my attention,” Dr O’Grady added.
She also said she had no medical notes or recollection of Satchwell attending her surgery with scratches across his face.
“I have no medical records as to that or recollection of that attendance,” she added. “I kept excellent medical records during my entire career.”
Angela Sheehan told the trial she knew Mrs Satchwell from attending Fermoy swimming pool.
She said they were acquaintances and would wave at each in the street but were not “best friends”.
They had a shared interest in their love for animals, and Mrs Satchwell was into fashion, her high heels, hair, makeup and jewellery, which they always spoke about.
“She was a lovely girl, pleasant to talk to, bubbly and good for a laugh,” she added.
She said she did not know her family, nor where she lived and that they had never exchanged phone numbers.
They never saw each other again after she left Fermoy and moved to Youghal in 2016.
She said that she saw Satchwell when she was parked outside a hotel in Fermoy.
The jury heard that Satchwell came up to her car window and asked if she knew where his wife was.
He was with a journalist, she added.
She said she did not know where Mrs Satchwell was.
“He never touched me or went near me,” she added.
The trial continues.
