The man who brought his dead uncle into a Post Office branch to collect his pension states that he should "win an Oscar" if he is lying about his version of events.
Declan Haughney and a friend walked his uncle Peadar Doyle from his home to a Post Office to collect his pension - and claim that they did not realise he was dead by the time they reached the counter.
Declan has also claimed to The Irish Mirror that with hindsight, he should have alerted people that his uncle was not well in the days leading up to the horrifying incident, after discovering him "under the bed", where he said he was lying for "two days".
“Now in the last month he’s telling me he doesn’t feel well, he’s after deteriorating.
“He says Declan, ‘I don’t feel well’. I said to myself ‘I don’t feel well either’.
“He was on the ground off the bed. I said what’s wrong, he said ‘I’m grand’.
“I went back in a few hours later and he was under the bed,” he claimed.
“I tried to coax him out from under the bed but no he wouldn’t.”
Declan’s comments come as The Star can also reveal today that the garda investigation into the events that happened at the post office are now centred on whether anyone “failed to notify” the authorities of a dead body.
Declan said that on Friday he went down to Hosey’s Post Office to collect Peadar’s money, but was told that the pension holder had to be present.
He claims he therefore went back to the house, and got Peadar off the ground, and with the help of his pal Gareth Coakley, linked arms with him and walked him down Pollerton Road, on the five minute journey to the post office.
Declan insists he would never try to steal his uncle’s pension, nor did he know he was dead at the time.
“Reporters are not fools. You can see through people. You know what a liar is – of course you do.”
He added that if he was lying he must be a good actor, saying: “Well I tell you one thing, for what I told you I should win an Oscar.”
But he said “people in the town” believe the worst of him – namely that he’s a drug addict who tried to steal his uncle’s pension.
“In their eyes now that’s it.
“See that’s people in the town giving statements saying Declan is a drug addict. No, no, no.
“I’m 13 nearly 14 stone, do I look like a drug addict man?” he said.
“Them days are gone. I’m off the gear three years in May.”
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