Lu Na McKinney: Man loses appeal over boat trip murder conviction - BBC News
Stephen McKinney was jailed for a minimum of 20 years for killing Lu Na McKinney in April 2017.
Stephen McKinney had denied murdering his wife in 2017

A man who murdered his wife during a boating holiday in County Fermanagh has lost an appeal against his conviction.

Stephen McKinney was jailed for a minimum of 20 years for murdering 35-year-old Lu Na McKinney in April 2017.

Her body was recovered from Lough Erne near a jetty at Devenish Island, where the couple were moored on a hire cruiser with their two young children.

McKinney, 47, who is originally from Strabane, was seeking to overturn his conviction and challenge the sentence.

He claimed his wife fell into the water while on deck to check mooring ropes and that he tried to save her.

But in 2021 a jury at Dungannon Crown Court found him guilty of his wife's murder after accepting the prosecution case that it was not a boating accident.

At the Court of Appeal in June McKinney's lawyers advanced a number of grounds in his attempt to have the verdict declared unsafe.

The prosecution argued he was convicted after an "overwhelmingly strong case" was presented to the jury.

The three appeal court judges listened to the recording of the 999 calls McKinney made on the night his wife drowned which were played during his trial.

They considered seven grounds of appeal that his conviction was unsafe but these were all rejected.

In dismissing the appeal, Mr Justice O'Hara said they had not been persuaded by any of the grounds advanced on behalf of McKinney.

He said the crown court judge had shown skill and care in the many legal rulings she made and her analysis of the evidence during a lengthy and complex trial.

"Having rejected the grounds of appeal individually we conclude by recording our view that even taken collectively there is nothing in this appeal which makes us doubt the safety of the jury's verdict," he said.

A further hearing will take place in the new year to consider an appeal against the length of his sentence.