A FIFTH MAN will stand trial after denying being involved in the murder of Coventry teenager, Daniel Kirkwood.
Ezra Scott of Hawksyard Road, Erdington, Birmingham, pleaded not guilty at Warwick Crown Court to the murder of the 18-year-old who died in hospital shortly after he was stabbed in the neck outside Society Nightclub on March 15.
Four other men, Tobijah Thompson, Hasham Ali, Ramez Murtaza and Zaker Khan, all from Birmingham, have already pleaded not guilty to the murder at a hearing at the court last month.
But the charge could not be put to 31-year-old Scott at that time because his lawyers were planning to make an application for the case against him to be dismissed.
However, his application was rejected by Judge Richard Griffith-Jones and Scott appeared via video link from prison after a mistake led to him not being taken to court.
Entering a not guilty plea, Scott also denied further charges of wounding Niall Kavanagh and Nigel Mkhwananzi with intent to cause them grievous bodily harm, violent disorder and assaulting a fourth alleged victim, Christopher O’Brien, causing him actual bodily harm.
The four other men – 25-year-old Thompson of no fixed address; 21-year-old Murtaza of Bordesley Green East, Bordesley Green;
25-year-old Khan of Belchers Lane, Small Heath; and 18-year-old Ali of Amberley Green, Great Barr – also denied those charges.
Tobijah Thompson, previously of Blakesley Way, Bordesley Green, also pleaded not guilty to possessing an offensive weapon – a knife – inside the Coventry nightclub.
Prosecutor Michael Burrows QC said there were CCTV recordings of events both inside and outside the nightclub – and that five different versions of the footage are being prepared to highlight the alleged movements of each of the five defendants.
Judge Griffith-Jones adjourned the case for trial, which is due to begin on January 12, 2016, possibly at Birmingham Crown Court in front of a High Court judge, and remanded Scott in custody until then.
