A Tipperary farmer has been sent forward for trial to the Central Criminal Court to face a charge of murdering a man whose body was found almost 2 years after he was reported missing.
52 year old Bobby Ryan, a separated father of two, who used the stage name Mr Moonlight when he worked weekends as a DJ, had been classified as a missing person for almost two years before his body was discovered in an underground concrete waste disposal tank on a farm located some 5km outside Tipperary town on April 30, 2013.
In March of this year, 49 year old Pat Quirke of Breanshamore was charged with his murder.
This morning, at a sitting of Tipperary District court, Judge Elizabeth MacGrath returned Pat Quirke for trial to the current session of the Central Criminal Court in Dublin, following service of a Book of Evidence in the case.
Quirke, who was present in court, is charged with the murder of Mr Ryan on a date unknown at a location unknown between June 3, 2011, and April 30, 2013.
Judge MacGrath consented to the defence’s request to certify legal aid for one solicitor, one junior counsel and one senior counsel. She remanded Quirke on continuing bail fixed by the High Court in March.
