A fingerprint found on a bag that contained baseball bat assault victim Natasha McShane's passport has been matched to the man accused of her attempted murder, a court has heard.

Tapes of the suspect seeming to admit the crime have also been aired.

“I probably hit her once … took her sh**, that’s it.” he is heard saying on a Cook County Jail recording, seemingly unaware that all inmate’s calls are recorded.

Heriberto Viramontes is accused of the attempted murder of Irish exchange student McShane, 27, and her friend, Stacy Juric, in Chicago three years ago.

The attack on the Co. Armagh student was so vicious, that her injuries have left her brain damaged and unable to walk or talk.

Yesterday Cook County Criminal Court was told that a fingerprint discovered on a plastic bag that had been dumped in a bin and which contained the victim's passport had been matched to a fingerprint taken from the accused.

In his testimony Michael Cox, a fingerprint expert attached to the Illinois State Police crime lab, concluded that both the fingerprints matched.

However, under cross-examination, Cox admitted part of his analysis was subjective and the print from the bag was distorted.

Yesterday also prosecutors said they recorded hours of telephone conversations between Viramontes and his girlfriend, Kira Lundgren, while he was in custody.

At one point he says “At the same time they cannot charge me with attempted murder. My intentions was not to kill nobody, not to try and kill nobody. My intention was to get money, to get high.”

“If she died I would be f.....d,” he says.

He also states: “Armed robbery? Ok, fine.”

“I don’t know what I did, I was high. I did some stupid shit. I probably hit her once, took her shit, that’s it.”

At one point Lundgren says “She’s going home right now and they held a fundraiser for her, raised a lot of money. There’s going to be one for Natasha.”

“For what?” Viramontes replies. “For medical bills,” Lundgren says.

He is told “both are doing better, keep getting better, that’s really good.”

Viramontes then starts to cry.

“It’s nobody’s fault but my own. I tried to talk to them. I tried to help out people in the wrong way,” he says.

Lundgren told jurors that she saw Viramontes and his co-defendant and then girlfriend, Marcy Cruz, late on the night of the attack.

Lundgren said they picked her up in Cruz's van and when they stopped at a petrol station, she saw the defendant talk to another customer.

She said that he appeared to have a credit card in his hand, that he seemed "agitated" and was waving his hands "emphatically" as he spoke.

The following day Lundgren said she saw Viramontes and Cruz studying a newspaper, but added that they would not let her see what they were reading.

Cruz, who testified against Viramontes last Monday, alleged that on the night McShane and her pal were robbed and assaulted, she was with the accused who grabbed a baseball bat from her van, then jumped out, returning three minutes later with two purses and told her he had done something "bogus".

She claimed he took the credit cards while she took cosmetics.

Lundgren is tesifying against her boyfriend in return for a shorter prison term, after she was nabbed smuggling marijuana into the jail where he was being held.

And yesterday she told the court she saw "high-end" cosmetics on Cruz's kitchen table.

The victim, who was attending the University of Illinois at the time of the savage assault, now needs constant care as she struggles to deal with her life-limiting injuries.

Viramontes is charged with two counts of attempted murder and 23 other charges, from misuse of a credit card to aggravated battery.

The trial continues.