A British gunman who carried out the Kinahan cartel murder of dissident republican Michael Barr in a Dublin pub a decade ago has lost a bid to overturn his conviction, with the Court of Appeal ruling that the trial court was correct to dismiss the evidence of a witness concerning the height of one of the gunmen.In dismissing the appeal by David Hunter (47), Judge John Edwards on Monday said the assessment of eye-witness evidence by the Special Criminal Court was both “cogent and rigorous”. He said the court had expressed its concerns about the reliability of one witness, who said the gunman was over 6ft tall, while Hunter was only 5ft 10in. Liverpool native Hunter, with an address at Du Cane Road, White City, London, had denied the murder of 35-year-old Michael Barr at the Sunset House pub in Dublin’s north inner city on the night of April 25th, 2016. He was found guilty by the Special Criminal Court in September 2020. Barr was shot seven times after two armed men wearing boiler suits and full rubber masks entered the the pub at about 9pm. He was shot five times in the head, once in the leg and once in the shoulder.At his trial before the non-jury Special Criminal Court, presiding judge Alexander Owens found that evidence had been heard in a “compelling way” that Hunter was one of the two gunmen who entered the Summerhill pub and murdered Barr. The judge noted the murderers had failed to burn out the silver Audi getaway car, which had been abandoned on Walsh Road in Drumcondra a few minutes after the killing, while the pair had also dropped a burner phone at that site.He said the major part of a DNA profile taken from a ski mask recovered from the car during the investigation into the shooting of Barr matched the profile of Hunter.In a voluntary statement to gardaí, Hunter said the ski mask was his but he had dropped it in a car driven by another man when he visited Ireland two months before the murder on a car-stealing exercise. The judge said the circumstantial evidence in the case “pointed inextricably” to Hunter’s guilt and no other rational explanation could be drawn.Last year, Hunter launched an appeal against his conviction, arguing the trial court erred in rejecting the evidence of witnesses present in the Sunset House who said there was a difference in height between the two assailants who entered the pub and killed Barr.Representing Hunter, Michael Bowman said that a witness in the pub was very clear in the physical description he gave, identifying a distinction in height between the two men.This witness had said the gunman was wearing a ski mask under a latex mask, but Bowman said the trial court had refused to acknowledge what the witness had seen. He said this witness identified the gunman as being 6ft 1in or 2in, while Hunter is 5ft 10in.Concerning the testimony of witnesses present in the Sunset House, Judge John Edwards on Monday said he was satisfied that the assessment of this evidence by the Special Criminal Court was both “cogent and rigorous”.Noting the trial court had identified and clearly articulated a number of “un-allayed” concerns on the issue of the reliability of the testimony provided by one witness, the judge said he could find no error in the court’s approach.Concerning the DNA evidence, the judge noted that it was not until shortly before the trial that the appellant stated the DNA matching his profile found on the ski mask was due to him heaving it in a car during a prior visit to Dublin. He went on to say that no explanation had been provided as to how the appellant’s DNA also came to be on the latex mask. Concerning the mobile phone evidence, the judge noted it was now accepted by the Director of Public Prosecutions that the phone data accessing and data retention legislative regime that existed in Ireland at the relevant time was in breach of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. However, he went on to say that the trial court was entitled to determine the impugned evidence could be admitted. “The gardaí acted reasonably having regard to Irish domestic law at the relevant time,” he said.In summary, the court dismissed the appeal.