Aidan Mann: Stabbing victim told friends he feared attacker 'wanted to fight'

Aidan Mann, 28, was a tattoo artist based in Bangor

A tattoo artist who was killed on a County Down street texted his friends prior to his death saying he was afraid his attacker wanted to start a fight with him, a court has heard.

Aidan Mann was stabbed 14 times outside a car dealership on Church Street in Downpatrick in January 2022.

The court viewed graphic CCTV that showed him being chased and attacked by his neighbour Barry Donnelly.

The 38-year-old is due to be sentenced for manslaughter next week.

The father-of-two was actively psychotic at the time of the attack, a plea hearing at Belfast Crown Court was told on Wednesday.

During the hearing, it emerged that the two men lived in the same block of flats but barely knew each other.

Mr Mann - also known as Zen Black - moved into his flat two months prior to his death.

The fatal incident began outside the apartment block, where he was captured on CCTV leaving just before 11:00 GMT wearing a motorbike helmet.

After being approached by Donnelly, he crossed the road and started running along Church Street, still wearing his helmet and being chased by his armed pursuer.

The fatal stabbing happened on Church Street in Downpatrick

The chase continued and, at one point, Mr Mann turned round, looked back at Donnelly and appeared to gesture at him before he crossed the road into oncoming traffic.

The CCTV footage then showed Donnelly catching up with Mr Mann on the pavement outside a car dealership.

After Mr Mann fell to the ground, Donnelly straddled him and stabbed him repeatedly in the chest, leg and torso.

Members of the public intervened, pulled Donnelly off Mr Mann and called 999. He was arrested while still being restrained by the public.

Two large kitchen knives that were used by Donnelly were seized from the scene.

'He lost control'

A post mortem concluded the cause of death was a stab wound to the chest that penetrated the heart.

The pathologist also noted 13 further stab wounds.

A prosecutor told the judge that at the scene Donnelly shouted it was a revenge attack for his brother who had been murdered the previous evening, which the lawyer said "transpired to be completely wrong".

Donnelly was interviewed the following day and admitted arming himself with knives before chasing and stabbing Mr Mann.

He also said he had been having problems with neighbours, that he lost control and that he did not set out to kill him.

Donnelly subsequently pleaded guilty to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility and of possessing two large kitchen knives on Church Street on the same date.

When Mr Justice O'Hara asked if the two men were well known to each other, he was told by the prosecutor that in the week before the stabbing, Donnelly had called the PSNI several times and claimed his neighbour had called him a "paedo and pervert".

The prosecutor added that in December 2021, Mr Mann called the police and reported his drunk neighbour was shouting, banging his door and trying to get into his flat.

He added that as a result police were called to the flat and "no offences were detected".

'Regret, remorse and heartbreak'

The prosecutor also raised the "profound effect" the loss of Mr Mann has had on his family.

Donnelly's barrister said the defence recognised "the very considerable loss that has been inflicted on the Mann family" and spoke of the "regret, remorse and heartbreak" his client has expressed.

In the month after his arrest, Donnelly was transferred to the Shannon Clinic - a secure psychiatric unit - where he remains.

His abnormal mental functioning and paranoid schizophrenia diagnosis were highlighted by the defence who said the stabbing occurred when his client was "actively psychotic".

Revealing that for ten years Donnelly was not registered with a GP and never sought hospital treatment, the defence barrister said Donnelly was not aware he was suffering acute mental illness until after the "terrible act" which claimed Mr Mann's life.

After listening to submissions from both the prosecution and defence, the judge said he wanted time to reflect on what he heard and that he would pass sentence next week.

Donnelly will also be sentenced for attacking a mother and son with a golf club in an unrelated incident on Bridge Street in Downpatrick in 2021.