Natalie McNally’s ex ‘lying and lying again to police to help himself’ – trial

An ex-partner of Natalie McNally had been “lying and lying and lying again” to police to help himself, Belfast Crown Court has heard.

The man, who cannot be named because of a court order, described Ms McNally as his best friend, and said he had wanted to help police.

He told court this week he wanted to “tell the truth for Natalie” even if he self-incriminated himself about other matters.

However it was put to him that he reset his phone before being interviewed by police and lied about the level of contact he had been in with Ms McNally.

Defence barrister John Kearney KC put to the man that he had been “doing his best to help himself” and “deliberately left out anything that you thought would be a problem for you”.

“I want to suggest to you what you were doing was lying and lying and lying again,” he said.

The man said there had been “little white lies” to police around contact, but that his statement was “not full of lies”.

“Someone’s just been killed, there are detectives in your house, you don’t know what’s going on, yeah, I got arrested a day later and you can see I addressed all of the lies in it,” he said.

Ms McNally, 32, was 15 weeks pregnant when she was killed at her home in Lurgan on December 18 2022.

Her partner, Stephen McCullagh, 36, of Woodland Gardens in Lisburn, is on trial for her murder.

He has denied the charge.

Previously, McCullagh’s trial heard he told police that Ms McNally’s ex had been responsible.

The man responded saying that was “ridiculous” when that was put to him in court on Monday.

He described Ms McNally as his best friend, and insisted that McCullagh was responsible for her death.

A jury of six men and six women has been sworn in to serve during the trial, which is expected to last about five weeks, before Mr Justice Patrick Kinney.

Ms McNally’s family and friends have been watching on from the public gallery during the trial.

The former partner returned to continue his evidence on Tuesday.

He was reminded several times during his evidence of his right not to answer a question if he risked self-incrimination.

“I know, I don’t care, I’m here to tell the truth for Natalie, and that’s what I’m going to do,” he said.

On Monday, the court heard that the man had been watching the World Cup final with his then partner on the night that Ms McNally was killed, and that his then partner had a video of him on that night asleep on the sofa.

On Tuesday, he said he first learned Ms McNally was dead after one of her neighbours contacted him on the Snapchat app to tell him.

“She said she’s been murdered, I think she said Natalie has been stabbed at the top of her stairs,” he said.

He also said he thought the killing might have been accidental, or that she might have miscarried and taken her own life after some negative messaging between them recently.

He was also told by his then partner that police had been to the house to speak to him about Ms McNally while he had been at work.

Mr Kearney KC asked him about how he had factory reset his mobile phone days after her murder.

The man said that had been nothing to do with Ms McNally’s murder.

He said he did it before he spoke to police because he was concerned about drugs he had in his house.

“I factory reset it for a reason… it had nothing to do with deleting messages between me and Natalie.”

He described having two detectives sitting in his flat while he had a “big bag of weed” in a cupboard.

“It was because there would have been messages to do with drugs, and weed in particular,” he said.

Asked why he had not just deleted those particular messages, he responded: “My best friend had just been murdered, detectives were in my house, I wanted to get there quick, I factory reset the phone because I had a feeling they’re going to smell the weed.

“That didn’t happen, in hindsight I didn’t need to do that and I shouldn’t have done it, but I was worried they were going to want my phone.”

Mr Kearney also asked if he had told Natalie’s neighbour that there had been some “nasty” messaging between McNally and himself.

He responded: “I was probably telling her everything, the truth, I had been sending nasty messages, dirty messages, whatever.”

He conceded some of his messages to Ms McNally “weren’t nice”, and that he had taken advantage of her.

“I’m not proud of any of them, this is so difficult to sit here and look at these, the poor girl is dead and this is what we’re talking about, these emails from me, and it’s so bad,” he said.

“I have had a drinking problem, I’m eight weeks sober tomorrow… it’s been a really big issue. I didn’t think it was that bad of an issue but it is, and I have only come to terms with it.

“Back then I was drinking every night, I wasn’t getting any sleep, my head’s been up my ass my whole life, and I’ve sent these horrible messages… I would have been drunk in most of these emails.”

The trial continues.