A drug dealer shot twice in the head at close range with a shotgun had no chance of surviving his injuries, a jury heard.

Philip Smith was killed when he met Nicholas Hickson at an isolated lay-by in Tong Lane, Tong, Bradford. Hickson, 32, of Royds Avenue, Birkenshaw, is accused of carrying out the murder over a drugs debt he owed.

He denies the charge but has admitted the shooting, telling detectives that the weapon went off inadvertently when Mr Smith lunged for it.

The killing occurred three years to the day after Hickson was brutally "knee-capped" by Mr Smith over a £9,000 drugs debt, the trial at Leeds Crown Court was told.

Dr Kenneth Shorrock, a consultant pathologist, who carried out a post-mortem examination after the shooting on February 19, 2002, told the jury how the first shot went into the left side of Mr Smith's neck, paralysing him.

"As a consequence he would have been immediately unable to use his limbs," he said. "He could not have fought or used his arms or his legs. As a result of that damage he would have been paralysed and would have lost a lot of blood."

He told the court the shot would have eventually proved fatal but the second shot, which entered his brain through his left ear, would have killed him instantly.

"This injury through the ear into the cranial cavity would in any circumstances cause instant death," he said.

"There are not many circumstances where I would be prepared to say that."

Linda Hickson, the defendant's mother, told the court how Mr Smith had appeared at Dewsbury Hospital after her son was beaten in 1999.

"He didn't look at me but he said to Nicholas 'who has been doing this to you, you best behave yourself'," she said.

Mrs Hickson, an acting manager at Batley Jobcentre, told the court that following the atttack her family managed to raise £3,500 to pay off part of a £9,000 debt her son said he owed two men in Wyke for clothes and electrical equipment.

Despite working seven days a week as a plumber and heating engineer, Mrs Hickson added that her son never seemed to have any spare money.

Earlier in the trial, the jury was told Mr Smith, a second-hand car dealer and father-of-one, of Highfield Avenue, Pudsey, had made Hickson sell drugs for him to try to pay back the debt which had spiralled to £17,500.

The trial continues.