A man, alleged to have plotted to murder a gunman in a revenge attack, told different stories about his own shooting, a court heard yesterday.
James Fletcher, 26, along with his uncle Christopher Fletcher, 46, is accused of plotting to kill Mohammed Nissar Khan, known as Meggy, as retribution for shooting him.
The prosecution allege the Fletchers conspired with close friend Raymond Daniels and others to murder Meggy and a gunman was hired, but the attempt, in August, 2007, failed.
Meggy was shot in the abdomen at his girlfriend’s home in Dobkiln Lane, Bingley. He suffered a perforated colon and lacerated liver.
Bradford Crown Court has heard James Fletcher was shot in the leg in June 2007.
The jury was told that two days later a detective was contacted by Sean Cutler, whose daughter was James Fletcher’s girlfriend. He told the officer Fletcher had told him an Asian male called Raz or Rash had put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger, but the gun had jammed. Fletcher had thumped him and he had been shot in the leg while trying to free the gun.
But in a police statement in October, James Fletcher said he had gone to a flat in Holme Wood to meet a friend but heard a bang and fell to the floor.
He said in his statement: “I turned round and saw two people wearing balaclavas. One struck me round the head with an iron bar. My next memory is of jumping a wire fence into a field.”
Fletcher maintained to police that he did not know who had shot him.
But prosecutor James Goss QC said secret police recordings made it clear Fletcher knew Meggy was responsible.
Mr Goss told the jury: “We anticipate it will now be accepted that James Fletcher did know Meggy was responsible for shooting him and that there was a plan in March, 2008 to attack his property, but no plan, it will be said, to attack him personally.”
The prosecutor claims that after the failed shooting of Meggy, there were further careful plans to attack him.
Mr Goss said two cars, a Mercedes and a Nissan Navara, were stolen to order and given false plates. He claimed they were used by the conspirators for reconnaissances of places where Meggy might be. When the cars were recovered by police they contained cans of petrol, which he alleged were to burn out the vehicles and destroy the evidence.
Mr Goss added: “It is an indication of the lengths the defendants were willing to go.”
James Fletcher, of Grove View Farm, Daleside Road, Pudsey, and Christopher Fletcher, of Fletchergate, Nottingham, both deny conspiracy to murder, between June 2007 and May 2008.
The trial continues.
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