A motorist accused of murdering a non-league footballer “deliberately drove into a crowd of people intending to kill them” following an argument outside a bar, a court heard.
Tyler Fairman, a 26-year-old footballer with Woodthorpe Park Rangers, was one of several pedestrians injured after a red Vauxhall Astra, allegedly driven by Duane Anthony, mounted a kerb and struck a group of people in Arnold near Nottingham in the early hours of May 9.
Mr Fairman suffered a severe brain injury which ultimately led to his death in hospital on May 12, Nottingham Crown Court heard on Tuesday.
Defendant pleads not guilty
Anthony, 40, of Marton Road, Bulwell, has pleaded not guilty to murder and five counts of attempting to murder five other named individuals, who are all adults, and a charge of driving while disqualified. His girlfriend Destiny Carrier, 29, of Lothair Road in Leicester, is also on trial accused of assisting an offender.
Opening the Crown’s case at the start of the trial today, prosecution counsel Gareth Weetman KC said Anthony and Carrier, who had arrived at Sasha’s Bar in Front Street with two friends in a car that had been parked in a nearby road, had been in the premises at the same time as Mr Fairman and a group of his football teammates.
There had been an argument outside the bar between the two groups as people were leaving the bar at around 1am on May 9, which then moved into nearby streets. “It was a verbal altercation. No punches were thrown, no violence was used,” Mr Weetman told the jury.
CCTV played to jury
“After two to three minutes, Duane Anthony was seen to walk away down a nearby road, towards the car he had arrived in. The onlooker might’ve thought ‘there’s a man walking away from this disagreement’. That onlooker would have been wrong.
“Duane Anthony went back to that parked car and got back into it, with the intention of driving back to the area he left, back to the area he knew the group he had the disagreement with would be, with the intention of pointing that vehicle at the group and driving that vehicle into them.”
The moment the car ploughed into the group was captured on CCTV that was played to the jury in front of a packed courtroom. There was an audible gasp as the footage, which showed Mr Fairman and others “forcefully thrown” by the impact, was played, with some people in the public gallery leaving the courtroom.
Mr Weetman alleged Anthony drove at Mr Fairman and the rest of the group in a “cold, calculated and violent” way. The barrister said Anthony mounted the pavement “intent on aiming at the group he can see ahead of him”.
One man on the pavement managed to “miraculously” jump out of the way of the vehicle. “Others ahead are not so lucky, including Tyler Fairman,” Mr Weetman said. “Others have absolutely no hope, no chance of getting out of the way and avoiding what Duane Anthony does next. That decision by Duane Anthony is what this case centres around.”
Injuries and aftermath
Despite arriving at the bar with friends, Anthony is alleged to have been the only person in the vehicle when it was driven at the pedestrians.
East Midlands Ambulance Service was called to the scene at 1.10am, where paramedics found Mr Fairman unconscious and unresponsive, having suffered fractures to his skull and swelling to his brain. His life support was withdrawn in hospital three days after the collision.
Several other pedestrians were also taken to hospital, with one having suffered injuries to his head and shoulder, while a third had injuries to the back of his head, his shoulder and both elbows. A fourth person in the group was left on crutches after suffering swelling to his knee and another was taken to hospital by a friend after suffering tenderness to his ribs.
Mr Weetman said Anthony ran away after the collision. He said: “He didn’t stop to check on his victims, he didn’t call for emergency assistance – his first thought was about himself.”
Of Carrier, he said: “There can be no doubt in her mind that her boyfriend did that. She can see in front of her what he has done. The red Astra she drove earlier that night is there in the state we see it in. She goes over and stands where some of those injured by Duane Anthony’s actions are. There can be no doubt in her mind the severity of what has just happened. We say that is relevant to what she decided to do in the hours that followed what happened.”
The court heard Carrier got out of a taxi near her home address alone at 1.27am, but by 2.27am she had met up with Anthony and the pair were seen walking together “deliberately going left and right, not as the crow flies” in what the prosecution say was an attempt to stop him being found by police. The pair were seen together leaving an address in Bulwell at around 5.50am in a vehicle that had trade registration plates on.
Anthony was arrested later on May 9. The trial continues.
