This article is from page 17 of the 2008-06-17 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 17 JPG
THE ingredients used to make the dangerous poison ricin were listed out in court by Essam Eid’s partner.
Teresa Engle told the trial last Thursday that she and Mr Eid man- ufactured the poison using castor beans, acetone and another ingredi- ent. They then put it into a contact lens case and brought it to Ireland in September 2006.
‘“He’d got a recipe from the inter- net,” she said.
She said they made it with “castor beans, acetone and something else. I can’t remember.”
She told the court she did not know where they had acquired the castor beans.
Mr O’Connell put it to her, “You were involved in the manufacture of ricin,’ to which she replied, “Yes.”
Asked who did it with her, she said, id Bhshcy-0 00
““T think we oiled the beans, took the Skins off, blended it with acetone and something else, put it through a filter, dried it out, to become a powder.”
She said they then put it into a con- tact lens case and there was none leftover.
She said the two had put masks and gloves on, while they were making i
She said that Essam carried the contact lens case in his bag, with his own prescription medicines. She said she was not sure how the ricin was going to be used.
She told the court that “Essam had a website, ‘hitmanforhire’. He got an email from Sharon to kill PJ and his two sons, Robert and Niall. They corresponded. She sent a down pay- ment of, like, €15,000. That would have been in August 2006,” she said.
She said the ‘hitman’ website was set up in February or March 2006. Asked by Prosecutor Tom O’Connell did she see any of the emails, she re- plied, “Yes.”
Asked did Mr Eid use any other name, she replied, “Yes, Tony Lu- ciano. That was the name he used with the website.”
“She had called him several times and he had called her back several times,’ she added.
Asked did she hear this woman speak, she replied, “I heard her voice. It was a very strong Irish accent. She spoke very fast. He kept telling her Slow down, so he could understand her accent.”
Asked what was this woman’s email address, the witness replied, “It was ‘lyingeyes’.”
She said that after the money ar- rived at their home in Las Vegas, the
next stage was “Essam getting hold of Ash and going through with it, getting it done.”
Asked how this was to be done, she replied, “Ash was supposed to be poisoning the sons.”
Asked by Mr O’Connell did any- body else contact the hitman website during this time, she said, “Yes, there was another woman. There were sev- eral people who contacted it to look for work.”
Ms Engle told the trial that she and Mr Eid stayed at the Two Mile Inn hotel in Limerick, when they trav- elled to Ireland in September 2006.
‘He had instructions from Sharon that he had to get the hard drive of the computer in the office. The keys (to the office) were under a brick be- hind a house 1n Ennis,” she said.
She said they picked up the keys and then went into the office to get the computer.
“There was an alarm, but we did have the code from Sharon to turn off the alarm,” she said.
She said they got the main compu- ter hard drive, laptop and a bunch of cords from the office and they took those items back to the hotel.
She said that Essam was trying to reach Sharon but “I don’t think he was able to. He was quite furious. Then he decided instead to go to Robert and sell him the contract.”
She said she travelled with him to Robert’s house and she stayed in the car while he went to the door.