It was 45 minutes into the judgment before we learned that Brian Meehan had been found guilty of Veronica Guerin's murder, and for much of that time such a verdict seemed unlikely.
Mr Justice Morris had considered and, in turn, rejected the evidence of a series of prosecution witnesses, most damningly Charles Bowden, whose testimony was dismissed en bloc as "unreliable".
When he said of the last plank of testimony - from Russell Warren, another of Meehan's jailed fellow gang members - that it needed to be approached with "extreme caution" and had been "heavily challenged and criticised" during the trial, it was becoming very difficult to foresee a guilty verdict.
But then, like the big twist in a suspense novel, the judge concluded that the central part of Warren's testimony stood up. Most crucially, Eircell records confirmed a call between Meehan's and Warren's mobile phones six minutes before the 1996 murder, as they followed Veronica Guerin's car up the Naas Road. In a trial which had heard a recording of Ms Guerin's final words, made via her own mobile phone, the same technology was helping to nail one of her killers.
At 11.55 a.m. yesterday, Mr Justice Morris said the evidence could lead to only one conclusion, that Meehan was a "fundamental part" of the murder plot. He was, accordingly, guilty on count one. Meehan's face reddened a little at the verdict but it was his only visible reaction as he watched radio journalists rush from the court to phone the story for the midday news.
Dressed in summer clothes, including a black short-sleeved shirt and sandals, Meehan was otherwise calm throughout the hearing, exchanging occasional glances with his parents. Once, as the judge retold the details of Ms Guerin's killing, he produced a packet of Polo Mints and offered one to each of his garda escorts.
After his conclusion on the murder charge, Mr Justice Morris continued consideration of the drugs and firearms charges, finding him guilty on 15 of the 18 counts.
Then, as Meehan left the court for a consultation with his lawyers, he made a chinup gesture to his mother, Frances. This was repeated when he returned a few minutes later; and shortly before 1 p.m., after standing with arms folded to hear his sentence, he signalled to his mother he would phone her, before gardai led him away.
Veronica Guerin's husband Graham, and her brother Jimmy, were both in the court as the judge, in his concluding remarks, paid tribute the murdered journalist.
By her death, she had "contributed immeasureably" to the destruction of a major drugs importation business, Mr Justice Morris said. If many young people had been saved from the scourge of drug abuse as a result, he added, her dying "will have not been in vain".
