Jim McFadden was beaten to death outside his Shantallow home in 2006
A WOMAN from Derry was lost her bid to have her appeal against her conviction for manslaughter of Jim McFadden in the city re-0pened.
In 2009, Brenda Dolores Meehan was convicted of murdering Mr McFadden who was beaten to death outside his Shantallow home in Derry.
She was convicted along with her husband James Meehan and her son Sean Devenney.
The murder was a result of dispute which arose during a wedding in Co Donegal in May 2006.
The murder trial heard that after returning home from the wedding, James Meehan drove Brenda Dolores Meehan and her son Sean Devenney from Galliagh to Shantallow where Mr McFadden was attacked at his front door.
In 2011, the 47-year-old’s conviction was reduced on appeal from murder to manslaughter.
Now she and five men jailed over violent deaths in the North have been trying to have their convictions overturned because of a ruling on the joint enterprise law.
The law of joint enterprise allowed people involved in a fatal attack to be convicted of murder even if they did not inflict the fatal blow.
But in February, the Supreme Court ruled the law had been wrongly interpreted for more than 20 years in the case of R v Jogee.
At the the Court of Appeal yesterday, three senior judges said: “It seems to us inescapable that the proper avenue for these applicants is to consider the option of the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC)…..
“The right to re-open appeals lies beyond the reach of this court.
“In short we have concluded that the Jogee concept of “exceptional leave” is neither a fresh ground nor an additional basis for reopening an appeal.
“Accordingly, the applications to reopen these appeals are refused.’
The Court of Appeal judges said Meehan and the five other appellants should consider, if they deem it appropriate and if they have not already done so, referring their cases to the CCRC.
Lawyers for Meehan and the five other men now plan to raise their cases with the CCRC.
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