The man who shot Ashley Dale described dumping the Skorpion sub-machine gun which killed her in a wheelie bin in the Whiston area.
James Witham, 41, has admitted driving to 28-year-old Ashley's home in Leinster Road, Old Swan, in a Hyundai car and barging through the front door shortly after 12.30am on August 21 last year. Witham accepts spraying the inside of the property with the Skorpion, but told a jury he believed her home was empty and did not see or hear anything when he opened fire to "send a warning" to her boyfriend, Lee Harrison.
Ashley was found by police officers in the rear yard of her home unconscious, with a "catastrophic" gunshot wound to the abdomen, and was declared dead in hospital later that night. Harrison was out in the city centre at the time, the jury heard.
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The prosecution case is that Witham and Joseph Peers, 29, were "dispatched" to kill Harrison by Niall Barry, 26; Sean Zeisz, 28, and Ian Fitzgibbon, 28, who were allegedly directing the hit from a flat in Pilch Lane, Huyton. All five men deny murdering Ashley and conspiracy to murder Harrison and are standing trial at Liverpool Crown Court.
Richard Pratt, KC, representing Witham, asked his client about the morning of August 21, when he found out from his dad that a woman had been shot dead in Old Swan.
Witham told the jury: "I just thought it’s me that’s done it obviously. I couldn’t believe meself. I've never felt like that in my life. I thought I was having a nightmare. I didn't know what to do with meself.
"I just got in the car, walked round the corner, got in the car and drove to Joe Peers’s and asked is there anywhere I can store this car."
Witham said Peers agreed to store the car at the home of his friend, Kallum Radford, in St Helens, and told Witham to drive it there later that day. He said: "My head was done. I've never done anything like that in my life. I never told him nothing. I couldn't tell him nothing. I felt so ashamed of doing it."
Witham said after speaking to Peers, he drove the Hyundai to Stadt Moers Park, "by the Village Hotel, just off Whiston Lane". He told the jury he chose that area as "it was the one place I knew that had no cameras".
Mr Pratt asked: “What were you intending to do?" Witham said: "I parked the car up, took my clothes and the gun, put them in a bin bag, took some bin bags out the bin and just put them in a bin."
Mr Pratt said: “Where had the gun been after you used it to fire shots at Leinster Road?." Witham said: "I put it in the boot." Witham clarified: "There was a big alleyway with a row of bins, a load of bins there."
After dumping the gun, Witham said he "went for a little walk" around the park and then visited his sister and nephew, where he "smoked a spliff" before getting a taxi home, leaving the car in Whiston. Witham then described getting a taxi back to where the car was parked at around 2.20pm, before driving to Redgate Drive in St Helens, where he met Peers and left the Hyundai on Radford's driveway.
Witham said he and Peers left Redgate Drive in a taxi but then decided to go for a "swim, sauna and steam" at the Mercure Hotel in St Helens. He said the facilities were not working, but the pair decided to book a night's stay.
Mr Pratt said: "Why did you want to stay at a hotel?. Witham replied: “My head was battered. I was suicidal. I needed to be round someone. My head was f****** up. I bottled it all in. I’m a private person, I don’t tell no-one nothing, that’s what I do."
The jury has heard he later went shopping and for a meal with his young son in Liverpool ONE.
Mr Pratt, referring to CCTV showing Peers and Witham in the hotel reception area. He said: “We see you at a hotel reception, we see you shopping in Liverpool, we see you in a restaurant. You know the pictures we are referring to. To be frank, you don’t look particularly troubled. How were you really feeling?"
Witham replied: "I still couldn’t believe it happened. I tried to bottle it in, tried to keep it all in meself."
Paul Greaney, KC, prosecuting, later cross examined Witham on the CCTV of him and Peers inside the Mercure Hotel. He said: "We’re going to see you laughing and joking and looking up and down every woman that was there."
Witham said: "There was a party going on that night, the hotel was full.". Mr Greaney said: “We see you laughing and joking." He played the footage, which showed
Mr Greaney said: "There we are. We could watch minutes of this. I think you agree you are laughing and joking and eyeing up women?” Witham agreed. Mr Greaney said: "You are not a person there in terror. You’re not a person in a state of profound guilt. You're a person who had done what he was commissioned to do."
Witham said: “I had to bottle it in. I never spoke to no one about it.”
The jury has heard Witham claims he went to Leinster Road to "send a warning" to Harrison, who he claimed had been "robbing me" for around five years. He told the jury the decision was a "moment of madness" and "did not involve" any of his co-defendants sat watching from the dock.
The prosecution case is that the old dispute between Barry and Harrison flared up during the summer of last year due to a series of incidents, including an alleged assault on Zeisz, by Harrison's friend Jordan Thompson, at Glastonbury festival. Zeisz has also admitted blaming Thompson for bullying a mutual friend, Rikki Warnick, who killed himself on July 21.
Barry also described how Witham had a separate dispute with Harrison relating to the supply of drugs in North Wales, which flared up in July.
Witham, of Ashbury Road in Huyton, Zeisz, of Longreach Road in Huyton, Barry, of Moscow Drive in Tuebrook, Peers, of Woodlands Road in Roby, and Fitzgibbon, of Heigham Gardens in St Helens, have pleaded not guilty to murdering Ashley Dale, conspiracy to murder Harrison and conspiracy to possess a prohibited weapon, namely a Skorpion submachine gun, and ammunition with intent to endanger life. Witham has admitted the lesser charge of manslaughter.
Radford, now of Trentham Road in Kirkby – denies assisting an offender. The trial, before Mr Justice Goose, continues.
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