Jurors at Bristol Crown Court have been shown distressing CCTV footage of a university student stabbing his housemate dozens of times before fleeing and later returning home to make a pizza. Zack Coughlan, 23, accepts he killed Jamie Collins, 21, but denies murder.
Attack in shared garden
The footage, played on the second day of the trial, showed Coughlan dressed in black and wearing a mask as he inflicted 30 stab wounds on Collins in the garden of the student house they shared in Filton, near Bristol, on April 9. The court heard the pair lived and studied together but, despite a “resolved” fall out over rent, there was no apparent motive to the killing.
The camera, located on the garage, showed Collins approaching the gate before the attack began. Coughlan is seen wearing a mask, and a knife with blood is visible. The footage ends while the attack is still in progress.
Cover-up and return
One and a half minutes after the footage stopped recording, Coughlan is seen exiting the alley on a bike, later cycling away and walking through campus before depositing an item of clothing in a bin. He later returned to his home and walked down the garden path with a torch, where Collins could be seen lying on the ground.
Opening the case for the prosecution, Adam Vaitilingam KC said Coughlan ambushed Collins and stabbed him 30 times, leaving him dying in an alleyway before cycling away on the victim’s bike. The bike was dumped, and the killer changed his outfit and threw bloodstained clothing in a pond, prosecutors said.
Police call and claims
Coughlan returned to the scene three hours later, made a pizza, played games online, and called 999 eight hours after the killing. In the call, he is heard audibly crying as he tells handlers: “My friend’s been stabbed.” He told officers he had gone outside after seeing a gate open and found Collins’s body.
Initially questioned as a witness, Coughlan blamed his injuries on “climbing trees,” telling police: “I was a bit too ambitious. I climbed, it’s so juvenile, I climbed too high onto branches that couldn’t take my weight and I fell.” Prosecutors told the jury his blood was found on the victim’s bike and mobile phone activity matched his movements on CCTV.
Mr Vaitilingam KC said: “This was a carefully planned and cold-blooded execution. Someone who has lost control doesn’t plan ahead in the way that he did.” Coughlan, of Filton, South Gloucestershire, denies murder. The trial continues.
