Liverpool Crown Court has heard that an innocent woman was shot in her home after a feud between two groups reignited at the Glastonbury festival. Ashley Dale, who worked for Knowsley Council as an environmental health officer, died after being shot in the Old Swan area of Liverpool in August 2022. Five men deny murder, conspiracy to murder, and firearms offences, while a sixth man denies assisting an offender.
The prosecution claims that Ms Dale’s partner had been the intended target. On the night of 20 August, Ms Dale was at home on Leinster Road when her car tyres were slashed, causing the alarm to sound. Though she believed the alarm had been set off by rain and did not go outside, the court heard that James Whitham kicked down her door and shot her in the early hours of the following day. Mr Whitham has admitted being the gunman and pleaded guilty to manslaughter, but denies murder, claiming he shot Ms Dale by accident.
The background to the shooting was a dispute between a group associated with Ms Dale’s boyfriend Lee Harrison and another group. Mr Harrison had a long-standing feud with a man called Niall Barry, which the court heard was reignited at the music festival in June 2022. Tensions between the two groups increased further when a man named Rikki Warnick, known to both groups, took his own life the following month.
The prosecution alleges that Mr Barry, Sean Zeisz, and Ian Fitzgibbon organised the murder, while Mr Whitham and James Peers acted as “foot soldiers,” and Kallum Radford was the alleged driver of the getaway car. Mr Greaney, the prosecutor, played voice notes recovered from Ms Dale’s mobile phone, which he said provided a record of her concerns and those of her friends caught up in the events leading to her death. The trial is expected to last eight weeks
Read the full article from The BBC here: Read More