A murder charge against a Co Down man has been downgraded to manslaughter.
As 21-year-old Donach Rice appeared at Downpatrick Magistrates Court via videolink yesterday, a lawyer said the Public Prosecution Service had taken the decision to charge him with the manslaughter of Padraig Fox rather than murder.
Rice, of Kilkeel Road, Annalong, is alleged to have killed the 29-year-old on December 8 last year.
He faces five other charges including two counts of perverting the course of justice by giving police a statement which he knew to be false and by submitting himself to a knife wound “to give the false impression that the wound had been inflicted by self defence”.
He is also accused of stealing three bottles of alcohol from the Slieve Donard Hotel, attempted robbery of cash from another man, Daniel Curran, and fraud by false representation in allegedly cashing a winning betting slip at a bookmaker's.
The charges arose after the body of Mr Fox was found inside a flat on Burrendale Park Road in Newcastle.
It is understood he had only moved into the block of flats a few months before his death.
In court yesterday Rice’s solicitor said the case was a “one punch matter” and asked for him to be freed on bail given the change in the headline charge.
He said his client has “expressed remorse” over the death.
However, District Judge Connolly refused the application and remanded him back into custody to appear again on August 15.
At that stage he will stand in the dock alongside two co-accused, his cousin Nathan Rice and Paul Patrick Magennis, for the purpose of a preliminary enquiry, the legal process necessary to refer a case upwards to the Crown Court.
Nathan Rice (20), from Bernagh Green in Newcastle, is accused of burglary of the Slieve Donard Hotel, where he allegedly stole three bottles of alcohol, and perverting the course of justice in that he allegedly made a statement to police knowing it was false - with both offences allegedly committed on December 8.
Magennis (27), from Burrendale Park in Newcastle, is accused of the theft of a bicycle on December 6, two counts of perverting the course of justice and the attempted robbery of cash from Mr Curran on December 8.
Magennis is alleged to have perverted justice by also allowing himself to be inflicted with a knife wound “following the murder of Padraig Fox to give the false impression” of self defence and also that he “placed a knife under the hand of Padraig Fox following his murder.”
