Murder accused Patrick Quirke told gardaí he found it “intriguing” that Mary Lowry had a “couldn’t-care-less attitude” after the disappearance of her boyfriend, Bobby Ryan.

In interviews following the discovery of Mr Ryan’s remains, Mr Quirke also told gardaí that Mary Lowry had a “couldn’t care less attitude” about the disappearance of her boyfriend.

Ms Lowry was Mr Quirke’s former lover and the girlfriend of the deceased at the time he went missing.

Mr Quirke (50) of Breanshamore, Co Tipperary has pleaded not guilty to the murder of Mr Ryan – a part-time DJ going by the name Mr Moonlight – on a date between June 3, 2011 and April 2013.

Mr Ryan’s body was found in a run-off tank on the farm leased by the accused and owned by Ms Lowry at Fawnagown, Tipperary in April 2013.

The prosecution claims that Mr Quirke murdered Mr Ryan so that he could get back with Ms Lowry (52) with whom the accused had previously had an affair.

He claimed that he was not jealous of her relationship with the DJ, though he admitted it was “probably true” that he still had feelings for her.

Put to him that it ‘couldn’t have been easy to see her carrying on with Bobby Ryan’, Mr Quirke replied: “No more than it was for her to see me with my wife.”

The trial at the Central Criminal Court heard that Mr Quirke was interviewed at Tipperary Garda Station on the day the body of Mr Ryan was uncovered in a tank on Ms Lowry’s farm at Fawnagowan, Co Tipperary.

Inspector David Buckley told the jury that he was one of the first gardaí to the scene after Mr Quirke alerted gardaí to the discovery.

He noted in the interviews afterwards that Mr Quirke was “fairly clean for a man doing a dirty job,” and Mr Quirke replied that he was “only getting into the dirty part, mixing the slurry.”

Put to him in cross examination by Bernard Condon SC for the Defence, the garda said from his recollection there was “no dirt” on Mr Quirke, on his hands or his clothing.

Mr Condon said “fairly clean” 18 months later there was “no sign of dirt” , which would he say the jury would prefer.

Mr Condon said the  gardai had not asked Mr Quirke for his clothing.

Garda Buckley said he distinctly remembers looking at him up and down and noticing that there was no sign of dirt. He had “a vivid memory” of this, though he couldn’t recall what clothing he was wearing. He said his terminology may have been misleading given in saying “fairly” rather than “perfectly” clean.

Asked about his movements on the day that Mr Ryan went missing, Mr Quirke said he had arrived at Mary Lowry’s farm “about twenty to, or a quarter to, nine.”

He had gone there to collect two bulls to bring home to his cows and he was going to leave them in for the weekend.

Asked if he had been at the tank that day, Mr Quirke said no, nor did he see anyone else at the tank that day.

“I was possibly only there half an hour that morning. We were going away. It was a case of get in and get out,” he said.

Asked if he knew Bobby Ryan, Mr Quirke told gardaí he had met him three times – the first time at Hayes’ hotel in Thurles, the second at a social night in Clonmel when he and his wife, Imelda went out with Bobby and Mary and the third time was ‘just a chance meeting’ at the office in Killough Quarry.

At this point in the interview, Mr Quirke asked if he thought he would be able to get his tractor back this evening, and the garda replied: “That I don’t know at the moment.”

Asked if he approved of the relationship between Mr Ryan and Mary Lowry, he said: “Well, I’m sure you know I had an affair with Mary Lowry. But I didn’t disapprove of it,” he said, adding that there was “no animosity between me and Bobby Ryan.”

Gardai asked him if that was the reason she had ended her relationship with Mr Quirke and he replied: “Possibly yes.”

“I don’t think we ever spoke about it candidly,” he added.

Questioned as to whether the relationship had ended “good or bad,” Mr Quirke said it had been “mixed,” explaining that he had wanted to keep it “friendly” as they were “family as such.”

Mr Quirke was asked if he had been “jealous” but said no.

“You just took it on the chin,” gardaí put it to him and Mr Quirke replied: “No,” adding, “What else could I do but take it on the chin.”

He had never had a one to one conversation with Bobby Ryan about Mary Lowry, he said, and said they never exchanged heated words.

Asked if he had met Bobby Ryan leaving Mary’s house that morning, Mr Quirke said no and then asked if he had known his body was there all along, Mr Quirke replied: “No. These are nice questions, now, lads.”

Mr Quirke said that “like everyone” he had “hunches” about what had happened to Mr Ryan.

“Everyone had notions, was he attacked, did he leave for Spain. I asked questions but found it strange and read too much into it,” he said.

Mary Lowry had told him ‘different things’ since the disappearance of Bobby Ryan, he said.

He found it “strange, then and now” that she couldn’t tell if Mr Ryan had been “ten minutes or two minutes” in the yard before he left.

He also thought it was strange “how she found the van so quick,” when she had travelled a route she knew he didn’t take.

Mr Quirke has asked her how she could see the van from the road but Ms Lowry had told her that she didn’t and “just drove in”.

“I found it intriguing she had a couldn’t-care-less attitude about it,” he said.

He told gardaí that Mary had told him that she had a friend who worked in a shop and had a conversation with a sales rep who had passed the van that morning.

“I told her she should contact him and she would not contact him. I also drew on the fact that she said she had not heard any car drive in to the yard that morning so I kept asking her on and off on different occasions and she was certain a car didn’t drive into the yard,” he said.

Asked why he didn’t show gardaí the underground tank when the farm was being searched in 2011, he said: “I didn’t think of it. i thought it was laughable to be emptying the slurry tank.”

Asked if this was because he knew the body was there, he said no.

The trial continues.

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