A Skipton man knifed in a local park told his friend: “Phone an ambulance, I’ve been stabbed,” before collapsing on to the ground, Bradford Crown Court heard yesterday.

Simon McMinn had challenged a drug dealer in Aireville Park accusing him of “scaring a kid” by approaching a boy aged 14 in the town and offering him “sniff,” the jury was told.

Brooklyn Bell, 19, of Parkwood Rise, Keighley, denies murdering Mr McMinn on the evening of July 28 last year.

The first witness in the trial, Mr McMinn’s friend Liam Brennan, said the two men had been friends since their late teens.

They were together that afternoon when they found out from sources in the town that the schoolboy had been approached by a drug dealer.

Mr McMinn, who had been upset and angered by the information, later seemed to have calmed down, Mr Brennan said.

The court heard that the men, both drug users, took a taxi to Aireville Park at 7.30pm.

Mr Brennan said he wanted to buy drugs and they met a dealer in a wooded area at the top end of the park.

He was walking away after making a purchase when Mr McMinn told the man: “You scared a kid.”

Mr Brennan said he shouted to his friend: “Come on, leave it.”

The next thing he heard was Mr McMinn saying: “Phone an ambulance, I’ve been stabbed.”

He had not seen either Mr McMinn or the dealer doing anything. He was walking off at the time, he told the jury.

He made the 999 call straight away and did chest compression on Mr McMinn who had slumped to the ground.

Mr Brennan said he didn’t speak again.

Paramedics and the police arrived after the dealer had “scurried off” the other way.

The jury has head that Mr McMinn, 44, was stabbed three times, once in the shoulder and twice in the back, causing “catastrophic injuries.”

He was treated by paramedics at the scene and then transported to Airedale Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Mr Brennan agreed that he at first told the police that Mr McMinn was attacked when they were just walking in the woods. He stated that a male in dark clothing “came out of nowhere.”

He gave that account because he had drugs on him, he said.

But after he was suspected of Mr McMinn’s murder, he told officers the truth.

The trial continues.