Murder trial opens over Scarlett Faulkner's death in Birr, Co. Offaly
Two women have gone on trial at the Central Criminal Court charged with the murder of Scarlett Faulkner (28), who died on 13 April after being struck with a metal pipe.
Two women face murder charges over fatal attack on Scarlett Faulkner in Offaly
The trial of two women charged with the murder of Scarlett Faulkner in Birr, Co. Offaly has opened at the Central Criminal Court, gript.ie reports. A jury of eight men and four women heard opening arguments from prosecuting counsel Seoirse Ó Dúnlaing SC.
Ms Faulkner, who was 28 at the time of the assault and died on 13 April shortly before her 29th birthday, was the second youngest of 16 children. The two accused are a 41-year-old woman and a co-accused who was 16 at the time of the offence and cannot be identified because she is a minor.
Pleas and charges
The younger accused pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to manslaughter. The older woman pleaded not guilty to murder. She also entered not guilty pleas to two charges of burglary and to charges of entering a building as a trespasser and causing criminal damage at an address in Co. Tipperary on 20 March 2025.
Ó Dúnlaing told the jury that both women are charged with murder and that the older accused faces additional burglary charges related to incidents the prosecution describes as part of a wider effort to "hunt" for Ms Faulkner and a man she had recently begun a relationship with — a former partner of the 41-year-old.
"Hunted down"
The prosecution's case, as outlined by Ó Dúnlaing, is that Ms Faulkner was targeted after it came to light she had entered into a relationship with the older accused's former partner. The jury heard that on 20 March 2025 the older woman sent a Facebook message to Scarlett's sister Victoria, reading: "Your smell-bag of a sister will pay for what she done," and "When I get her, I'll draw a map of Ireland on her face."
Ó Dúnlaing described the 41-year-old attending the homeplace of her ex-partner's parents, accompanied on a separate occasion by her son who was armed with a bat. CCTV footage, played for the jury after the lunch break, showed the older woman in a "teddy bear" dressing gown inflicting criminal damage at that address and carrying an axe. Garda Sergeant Dave Harney identified both the older and the younger accused in the footage.
The court heard that Ms Faulkner and the man had been at the apartment but had left shortly before the older accused arrived there looking for them.
Car rammed, assault captured on camera
Ó Dúnlaing told the jury that having located the pair travelling in a vehicle, the 41-year-old used her own car to ram their car off the road. Ms Faulkner then left the vehicle and ran across the road, at which point the assault was recorded on dashcams and mobile phone cameras.
The prosecution alleges that the then 16-year-old struck Ms Faulkner on the head with a 62cm metal pipe — described by Ó Dúnlaing as "ferocious and brutal" blows — hitting her 10 to 11 times. The pipe was shown to and handled by the jury. Ms Faulkner sustained a traumatic brain injury and, while she survived the initial assault, she died in hospital on 13 April. The older woman then brought the younger accused back into her car before both left the scene.
Ó Dúnlaing argued that when the younger accused struck the victim, she was acting as part of a "common design" with the older woman to kill or cause serious harm to Ms Faulkner. He said the girl intended "to kill or to cause a serious injury" to the victim.
Sister's testimony
Victoria Faulkner, Scarlett's younger sister and a prosecution witness, told the jury she received a series of abusive and threatening messages and phone calls from the older accused in the days before Scarlett was found critically injured.
Victoria told the court she had received two Facebook Messenger messages on the evening of Friday, 20 March — one from a person who had seen Scarlett, and a second from the older accused, sent after Victoria had posted that her sister was missing.
She said the messages contained vulgar names directed at her sister. Ó Dúnlaing read a number of them to the court, including: "Oh ya, I'm serious, but I promise you she will regret this," and "The thing crack pip aids the likes of her."
Victoria said she telephoned the older accused in order to find out where Scarlett was, as the family had not heard from her in two days — noting that Scarlett would "always send a message to say she was okay." During that call, she said, the accused was "shouting" and making threats, including the words "When I get her she's a dead woman" and "I'm here driving around, and I'm not going to stop until I get your sister."
The accused told Victoria that Scarlett was living in a trailer with a man. Victoria said she sought the location so her family could bring Scarlett away, explaining she believed her sister "had gone down a bad road with drugs and was not in the right state of mind." Among the further statements attributed to the accused during the call were that Scarlett would be "well off the drugs when she's on tubes in Cork Hospital" and that she was "a free prostitute."
Background on the victim
The jury heard that shortly before her death Ms Faulkner had been released from prison after serving a three-month sentence for theft charges, which Victoria described as "nothing serious." She had a daughter with a man she had been in a relationship with since 2010 and had been in and out of prison in recent years.
After her release, Scarlett visited Victoria and her children. Victoria told the court that when Scarlett was leaving that day, she asked her to call a taxi. "That was the very last time I seen her," Victoria said. The next time she saw her sister, she told the jury, was "on a hospital bed" — and she described her as being "dead."
The trial continues.
Source: Google News IE — Crime (en)