Recordings of anonymous phone calls made to police about an attempt to sell Noah Donohoe's laptop while the schoolboy was missing have been played at his inquest. One woman told Belfast Coroner's Court that she had not made the calls, despite a claim from another witness. She also denied that she or her family had been threatened before she gave evidence.
The inquest into the death of the schoolboy, which is being heard with a jury, has now entered its 10th week. Noah, a pupil at St Malachy's College, was 14 when his naked body was found in a storm drain tunnel in north Belfast in June 2020, six days after he left home on his bike to meet two friends. A post-mortem examination found the cause of death was likely to be drowning.
Proceedings resumed with evidence from witnesses about anonymous calls made to police in the days after Noah disappeared. One witness said he did not know Noah but had got to know another witness, AC3, through playing online bingo during lockdown. His statement said AC3 had visited him at his father's flat on June 21 2020, when Daryl Paul arrived and attempted to sell them a laptop. Paul has previously pleaded guilty to stealing a rucksack containing Noah's laptop and school books.
The witness said he had no interest in buying the laptop. Days later, AC3 told him the laptop sounded like the one Noah had been carrying. After speaking to another friend, they decided to report the matter to police. The witness said AC3 then made an anonymous phone call to police while he was with her in her car.
Recordings of two anonymous phone calls, on June 24 and 25, were played to the jury. In the first, the caller reported an attempt by Paul to sell the laptop at a flat, mentioning a plastic bag containing a rucksack, laptop, a green North Face coat, and a school book with Noah Donohoe's name. The caller said: 'I'm just really worried about this guy. If he knows something about where that boy is.' In the second recording, the caller expressed concern that the information had not been acted upon.
