A man accused of murdering his pregnant girlfriend Natalie McNally “put on an act” to cover his tracks, Belfast Crown Court has heard. This included a tearful 999 call to police, faking a six-hour video game live stream and suggesting that an ex-partner of Ms McNally’s had been responsible.
Ms McNally, 32, was 15 weeks’ pregnant when she was killed in her home in Lurgan a week before Christmas in 2022. Stephen McCullagh, 36, of Woodland Gardens, Lisburn, has denied her murder.
Prosecuting barrister Charles MacCreanor KC described a murder that was “planned, calculated and pre-meditated, one which he hoped to get away with”. He said Ms McNally’s cause of death involved compression of her neck, three stab wounds to her neck and five lacerations to her head.
The prosecution case is that McCullagh pre-recorded six hours of himself playing video games which he broadcast as live on the evening of Sunday December 18, and instead took a bus to Ms McNally’s home and murdered her. CCTV footage showed a man with a “mop of black hair” getting on a bus in Dunmurray and off in Lurgan.
McCullagh’s distressed sounding 999 call on the night of Monday December 19 was played in court. The prosecution contends this call was false and part of his plan to get away with the murder. The trial is expected to last around five weeks.
