Alleged killer told 'pack of lies', jury told as lawyers make closing speeches in Luke O'Connor murder trial - as defence claims deceased was 'up for a fight'
09.05.2023 - 17:59
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
Lawyers have made their closing speeches to the jury at the trial of a student accused of murder. Shiloh George Pottinger, 19, is standing trial after being charged with the murder Luke O'Connor in Fallowfield. He has pleaded not guilty.
Mr O'Connor, also 19, was stabbed eight times on Wilmslow Road in October last year. A row broke out between the pair after a friend of Mr O'Connor made a 'lighthearted' comment about Mr Pottinger's skateboard, Manchester Crown Court has heard.
During his evidence before the jury last week, Mr Pottinger admitted stabbing Mr O'Connor, a student at Manchester Metropolitan University, but maintained he was acting in self-defence.
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Mr Pottinger, then a student at BIMM, a university offering music courses, has pleaded guilty to possessing a bladed article, and claimed he had the knife to carry out work on his skateboard. On Tuesday, barristers for the prosecution and defence made their closing speeches to the jury, before jurors retire to deliberate and reach their verdict.
Prosecutor Mark Ford KC claimed that Mr Pottinger had told a 'pack of lies', and was making a 'desperate attempt' to 'escape the consequences of what he did'.
"We say this is a case of murder," he said. "What else, we say, could it be?"
"On any sensible view of the evidence this is not self defence." He alleged that Mr Pottinger had 'concocted an elaborate and false account' to 'avoid responsibility for what he did'.
The KC said: "He has, you may think, given quite a lot of thought to how he might try to explain away the evidence that shows his guilt."
Mr Pottinger's barrister Siobhan Grey KC claimed that Mr O'Connor, who was 6ft 2ins, was