A YOUNG father has denied looking for violence or handing a knife to the teenager who stabbed Coventry man Emmanuel Lukenga, causing a wound from which he bled to death.
Giving evidence at Warwick Crown Court, Bradley Richardson said he had taken part in torching a car used by a group of youths he claimed had been terrorising the Canley area.
But despite carrying an axe, he said that was ‘to show intimidation,’ and he had never intended to use it – and that co-defendant Enroy Ruddock was ‘on his own’ when he stabbed Emmanuel.
Richardson (23) of Prior Deram Walk, Canley; Ruddock (19) of Melbourne Road, Coventry; Matthew Brankin (19) of Thimbler Road, Canley; and Kyle Kinchen (18) of John Rous Avenue, Coventry, have pleaded not guilty to Emmanuel’s murder in June last year.
The jury has heard of a running feud between two groups of youths – ‘one from the Canley area above Torrington Avenue, and the other from the Tile Hill area below Torrington Avenue.’
It is said that on June 12, the defendants trawled the area on a stolen Triumph motorbike and in a blue Berlingo van, looking for members of the other group who included Emmanuel.
Prosecutor James Curtis QC said they got a can of petrol and torched a car outside an address where Emmanuel and some of his group were at the time.
Later, with Kinchen riding the Triumph and Ruddock on the back, and Brankin and Richardson in the Berlingo, they pursued the other group who fled into gardens of houses in Franklin Grove.
Ruddock and Richardson are said to have taken up the pursuit on foot, and Ruddock booted open a gate before stabbing 21-year old Emmanuel, allegedly as he was climbing a fence.
There was a single blow to the area of his bottom which severed a vital artery in the perineum, and he bled to death.
Ruddock has said he had knocked Emmanuel down and stabbed him as he was getting up, fearing for his own safety, using a knife he said he had previously been handed by Richardson through the window of the Berlingo – which was denied by Richardson.
Giving evidence, Richardson was asked by Mr Curtis what he, a family man with a young daughter, was doing with teenagers ‘torching a car that day.’
Richardson, who has admitted taking part in the arson attack, replied: “We were fed up of people coming and terrorising people.”
Mr Curtis remarked: “They were Tile Hill lads and you were Canley people, and the car had done nothing more than drive along public roads.”
Richardson said: “We believed it had driven up and down a few times, for no reason. We knew the people driving this vehicle had been terrorising people in the area.”
It was suggested: “So for cruising round, it was destroyed.” He answered: “The people in the car were part of the problem. We just burned it out. I had had enough of hearing things every day.”
Mr Curtis put to him: “You had a young daughter. Did that stop you going out on a raiding party that day?” And Richardson conceded: “It should have.”
But he added: “I put my hands up to arson. But we was never meant to be in the situation we’re in now.”
He was asked: “Did it stop you going out with a motorbike and a van hunting people?” He replied: “We were never hunting.”
Asked whether having a young daughter had stopped him carrying an axe, he said: “I never had any intention to use it. I never used it. I grabbed the first big thing to make it obvious, so no-one would come towards me.”
It was put to him that having a young daughter had not stopped him and Brankin in the Berlingo later chasing members of the other group along a footpath, but Richardson said: “That was not part of the plan. I was a passenger.”
Mr Curtis suggested the axe and a dagger were ‘part of your armoury that day,’ and that he had passed the dagger to Ruddock through the window of the van. But he insisted: “No, the dagger was never in that vehicle.”
Asked why, when they saw some of the Tile Hill group the van turned round and began to follow them, Richardson said: “We seen them with weapons, and it turned into a heat-of-the-moment, and we turned and it got silly. It just happened.”
Asked why they had become ‘the chasers,’ he replied: “They were doing expressions to us, and we turned round and the bike was in front, and Emmanuel attempted to swing at the bike.”
Richardson said Emmanuel had a seven-inch knife, which ‘looked like a hunting knife,’ in his hand as he did so.
He said he was in the van which he believed chased the group, who he said were armed with weapons including a knife, a hammer and a baseball bat, to scare them.
But he denied getting out of the van when it stopped to continue the pursuit on foot with Ruddock, adding: “I got out because I thought it was a puncture.”
Asked why, in that case, he got out of the van holding the axe, Richardson said: “We tried to scare them off. I walked a few steps forward to show intimidation.”
He denied chasing after them with Ruddock, and said he saw Emmanuel run into an entryway followed by Ruddock, but did not know Ruddock had a knife in his hand, insisting: “I honestly never gave him the knife. It didn’t happen.”
Mr Curtis put to him that Ruddock ‘boots open’ the garden gate to pursue Emmanuel and the others, but Richardson said: “I only had a glance of him kicking the gate. I didn’t see the knife. I didn’t arm him with no knife.”
The prosecutor suggested: “You were going to get the axe and the knife and stick it in anyone you could.”
Richardson responded: “What Mr Ruddock did was on his own. It was no plan of us. I stopped running. I’m not after Manny.”
He said he returned to the van and did not see Ruddock go through the gate into the garden, adding: “What he done was on his own. No-one else was part of it. There was no plan for us to do that.”
The trial continues.
