Gardaí are liaising with the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) in a bid to determine if they have enough evidence to bring the first charges linked to the fatal stabbing of Qayyum Balogun (21) in Dublin city centre last weekend.
From a Nigerian family based in Dundalk, Co Louth, university student Balogun was fatally attacked after attending a gig by Famous Pluto, a Nigerian artist, in Bewley’s Café on Grafton St into the early hours of Monday.
The victim was first attacked on Grafton Street before being pursued through Johnson’s Court and onto Clarendon Street, where he was cornered and fatal stabbed just before 3am. He was taken by ambulance to St James’s Hospital but was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.
Two arrests have been made since the killing, including that of a man in his 20s who is regarded as one of three people of interest identified by investigating gardaí.
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That man was detained on Wednesday under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act, which allows gardaí 24 hours of interview time before he must be either charged or released without charge. He has been interviewed, at a Dublin Garda station, by detectives during multiple sessions and evidence has been put to him.
Gardaí gathered evidence during a search of a property in south Dublin, where some of those involved in the incident last weekend are believed to have returned to after the killing. A number of items were taken from that property for examination.
Video footage from CCTV cameras on Grafton Street and the surrounding area has also been reviewed by investigating gardaí. Forensic testing has also been carried out at the crime scene and on the victim’s clothes. Witnesses who were on the street at the time have also been spoken to, as have some of those at the concert.
Gardaí were maintaining contact with the DPP’s office to determine if the arrested man should face criminal charges and whether the evidence gathered to date warrants such a development. A decision was expected by Thursday night.
At the expiry of his initial six-hour detection period, the suspect’s time in custody was extended for a second six-hour period and then for a further 12 hours. Both extensions approved by a senior officer in consultation with the investigating team.
The first person arrested as part of the investigation, a woman in her 20s, was detained on Tuesday but has since been released without charge. She is the partner of one of the three persons of interest in the case. Gardaí were trying to determine if she had aided that man in fleeing the country in the hours after Balogun’s killing.
Gardaí believe the woman’s partner crossed the Border into Northern Ireland on Monday before boarding a ferry to Britain and were last night trying to establish his whereabouts. He is believed to have first been in Scotland before going to England, possibly Manchester.
Detectives have ruled out a racial motive for the killing of Balogun and are trying to determine if he knew his killer, or at least moved in the same social circles, based on the African music scene in Dublin.
A Maynooth University student who also promoted gigs, Balogun was from a Nigerian family had lived in Ireland for years. He would have turned 22 in September and was due to begin his final year of computer science at Maynooth.
He did his Leaving Certificate in Ó Fiaich College, Dundalk, before studying business and computing at the Ó Fiaich Institute of Further Education. He appears to have been singled out for attack after a melee involving a large group of people erupted on Grafton Street in the early hours of Monday.
