One of the five men accused of the murder of Pc Sharon Beshenivsky after an armed robbery in Bradford last year has said he fired the fatal shot.
But Yusuf Abdillh Jamma, 20, of Whitmore Road, Small Heath, Birmingham, denies murder, saying he did not fire the 9mm pistol intentionally.
He admitted at Newcastle Crown Court two firearms offences and robbery.
Muzzaker Imtiaz Shah, 25, was cleared of attempting to murder Pc Teresa Milburn, Mrs Beshenivsky's colleague.
Shah has already pleaded guilty to the murder of Pc Beshenivsky outside the Universal Express travel agents on 18 November 2005, but denies firing the gun that killed her.
The judge, Mr Justice Andrew Smith, told the jury he had no case to answer over the attempted murder of Pc Milburn and directed them to return a not guilty verdict.
Earlier in the trial, Pc Milburn sobbed in the witness box as she recalled seeing Pc Beshenivsky's head "flop" to the side before she collapsed in a heap in front of her.
She recalled seeing an Asian man and a black man in the doorway of the premises, with the Asian man pointing a gun towards them.
The mother-of-one told the court the Asian man was responsible for injuring her and shooting dead her colleague.
Giving evidence in the witness box, Jamma admitted the gun which killed Pc Beshenivsky was discharged while it was in his possession.
He repeatedly denied the prosecution's suggestions that his version of events was a lie "to try to help Muzzaker Shah get off the attempted murder of Pc Milburn."
Peter Griffiths, QC, defending Jamma, asked his client if he "accepted that when the gun was discharged, fatally injuring Pc Beshenivsky, that that gun was in your possession at that time?"
Jamma replied: "Yes."
He told the court the three robbers inside the travel agents were his brother Mustaf, who remains on the run, Shah, and himself.
He said they all "started to panic" when two community wardens, who they thought were police officers, approached the locked door of the premises.
He said that everything happened "in a split second" when they left the travel agents.
Jamma, who was carrying a 9mm pistol fitted with a silencer, said what happened next was a "blur".
"I just remember hearing me pulling the trigger, sort of thing," he said.
"It wasn't a loud bang. It wasn't as loud as the bang we heard inside. It was sort of muzzled."
Asked by Mr Griffiths if he intentionally discharged the gun, he said: "No, I didn't."
Asked if he knew the gun he had was real and loaded, he said: "No, I didn't."
Asked if he remembered a second discharge of the gun, Jamma said: "I recall nothing at all from that point on. I carried on running away."
Asked if he recalled a third discharge of the gun, Jamma said: "No, not at all."
The three other accused, Raza Ul-Haq Aslam, 25, of St Pancras Way, Kentish Town, north London; Faisal Razzaq, 25, and his 26-year-old brother Hassan, both of Sebert Road, Forest Gate, east London, all deny murder.
The trial continues.
'Robbers had tried to pray at mosque' before PC was shot
killer spent £10k in 9 days
Er, no. Birmingham might be where he was arrested, but he's from Somalia, the same Somalia that was his apparent reason for being given refuge in our country, and the same Somalia to which his brother Mustaf Jama, is believed to have fled to avoid British justice.
I guess when the chips were down he figured that Somalia wasn't so
bad after all.
No comments:
Post a Comment