A 17 year old teenager has told the David Molloy murder trial jury how she saw him arrive at the house in Hemel Hempstead where minutes later he was stabbed to death.
The girl who can’t be named for legal reasons said she was outside the house in Saturn Way.
She said before he entered the house, he picked up a brick or rock.
The teenager said peeking though a small gap in the blinds of the living room window she saw part of the confrontation between Mr Molloy, 24, and the man who is accused of murdering him, 27 year old Mohammed Khalid.
She said moments later she went into the three storey town house and as she went through the front door heard Mr Molloy say: “I’ve been stabbed.”
Luton Crown Court has been told he suffered three stab wounds which it’s claimed were inflicted by Mr Khalid and it was a wound to his chest that proved to be fatal when the blade penetrated his heart.
Earlier the girl had told the jury how it was because of a series of messages she had sent Mr Molloy that he had arrived at the house at around 2.10am in the early hours of March 13 this year to confront Mr Khalid.
The jury has been told Mr Molloy was angry that his on off girlfriend, Karen Payne, had invited the other man back to her home that night.
The teenager told the jury on Wednesday: “I regret calling him.”
She was giving evidence on day three of the trial in which Mr Khalid, of no fixed address but who is from the Luton area, pleads not guilty to a charge of murdering Mr Molloy.
Three other people are on trial with him who are alleged to have helped him flee the scene of the killing.
Emma Payne, 41, of Eight Acres in Tring, Matthew Eyles, 44, who at the time was of no fixed address and Paul Smith, 48, of Hosking Court, Maylands Avenue, Hemel Hempstead all plead not guilty to charges of assisting an offender.
Mr Smith denies a further charge of doing an act tending or intended to pervert the course of public justice by later providing a false witness statement to the police who were investigating the death of Mr Molloy.
The court has heard how Mr Khalid was arrested two days later in London near the Pakistani Embassy as he tried to obtain travel documents, it was claimed.
Earlier Simon Wilshere prosecuting told how Mr Molloy had been in an “on off” relationship with Karen Payne for around three years.
There were frequent squabbles between the couple the jury has been told and, at the time of his death, Mr Molloy split his time between living with Karen and his parents, who lived locally.
The jury then heard how, on the evening of March 12 this year, Miss Payne, her sister Emma Payne and Mr Eyles were all at the home of Mr Smith in Hosking Court.
Also present was Mr Khalid, the jury was told.
Mr Wilshere said the jury would hear evidence obtained from messages on his mobile phone which suggested that while he was at the flat in Hosking Court that night Mr Khalid, who was also known by a number of nicknames including “Naz” and “T” “was concerned in the supply of drugs.”
The prosecutor went on: “It’s for that reason he felt the need to have a large knife on him.”
The jury was told they would hear evidence that suggested Mr Eyles, Emma Payne and Mr Smith were drug users.
Mr Wilshere went on: “It may well have been he (Khalid) was their drug supplier.”
Continuing his outline of the prosecution’s case, Mr Wilshere then told how after midnight in the early hours of March 13, Karen Payne and Mr Khalid left Hosking Court and returned to her home in Saturn Way.
The court was told that a 17 year old girl who was at the house at the time and who knew Mr Molloy decided to inform him through Facebook messages that she knew would get back to him, and texts, that Mr Khalid was in the house.
The court was told she was on friendly terms with Mr Molloy and was angry with Karen Payne that night because they’d had a row.
Giving evidence from behind a screen, the teenager was quizzed by barrister Jo Sidhu QC for Mr Khalid who asked her: “You never knew it was going to end up like this?”
She replied: “No.”
Mr Sidhu then said to her: “You could never have predicted David would end up dead.”
The girl replied “No.”
The barrister then asked her: “You knew which buttons to push with David that would get him worked up?”
She answered: “Yes.”
The girl was then asked: “You accept you got David seriously worked up?”
“Yes” she replied once more.
Continuing her evidence, the girl agreed that Mr Molloy, who was six feet tall, was not not afraid of a confrontation. She agreed he had a temper and could “handle himself.”
She said David Molloy at one stage called her while she was still at the property and was shouting down the phone: “What is Karen playing at.”
The girl went on: “I tried to calm him down and he hung up, but before he did, he said ‘I am coming over’.”
She said that frightened her and she sent him a message saying: “Please don’t come.”
Subsequently, when she discovered Mr Khalid had a knife on him she sent another message to Mr Molloy saying: “He’s got a knife.”
The girl said it made no difference and she got a message back from him saying: “He wants to get the f… out before I get there.”
She said in another message she received from Mr Molloy he said: “If I come there I will kill him.”
Continuing her evidence the girl agreed she was getting “panicky” about the imminent arrival of Molloy, and Mr Sidhu then asked her: “You felt the bloke (Mr Khalid) was a sitting duck?”
She replied: “Yes.”
The girl agreed she had even sent a message saying that the man had gone in an attempt to stop Mr Molloy coming to the house.
But she said moments later he “came round the corner” and up to the house and picked up a brick or rock before going in.
The girl told the jury that standing outside the house and was able to peer though a gap in the window blinds into the living room and could see Karen Payne sitting in a chair and Mr Khalid on a “long sofa.”
She said she could see Mr Molloy leaning over a stairgate between the living room and hallway and he appeared to be “eyeballing” Mr Khalid.
The teenager said she heard David Molloy then say: “Karen, what are you doing?” and at that point Mr Khalid got up and walked towards a TV set in the corner of the room.
She said he went into the corner of the room away from David and then David came though the gate.
At that point she said the pair were out of sight, but she could could hear shouting.
She said she went back into the property by which time Mr Molloy been stabbed and she saw Mr Khalid waving a knife around.
The jury has heard tow that night while at Saturn Way, Mr Khalid had been in phone contact with Eyles and Smith both before Mr Molloy had arrived at the property and afterwards.
As a result, said Mr Wilshere, Mr Eyles, Mr Smith and Emma Payne are said to have helped Mr Khalid get away from the murder scene and avoid apprehension that night.
He is alleged to have been taken in a van driven by Mr Eyles back to Mr Smith’s home in Hosking Court where he changed out out of his clothes before getting a taxi back to an address Wesley House in Chapel Street, Luton.
Mr Smith is said to have later given police a false witness statement claiming that between 10pm on the night of March 12 and 6am on March 13 he had been asleep in bed at his flat.
Mr Khalid was arrested on March 15 by Metropolitan police officers. He was near the Pakistani Embassy, said Mr Wilshere, and was trying get a travel document to leave the UK.
Case proceeding
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