Witness to gyrocopter death breaks down in court

Published: 2:49PM GMT 03 Mar 2010

Previous of Images Next Bryan Griffiths in his gyrocopter Photo: WWW.AIRTEAMIMAGES.COM Trevor Morse died after he was strike by a gyrocopter at Long Marston airport nearby Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warwickshire Photo: PA

Bryan Griffiths, 55, is charged with the murdering by sum loosening of Warwickshire Hunt part of Trevor Morse at Long Marston airport on Mar 9 last year.

Birmingham Crown Court listened that Mr Morse, 48, had been perplexing to stop Griffiths, an animal rights fan who had been monitoring the track from the air in his gyrocopter, from receiving off after he stopped to refuel.

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He refused to move out of the approach as Griffiths went towards him and the back propeller of the gyrocopter, relocating at a speed coming 200mph, cut his head from tip to bottom, murdering him instantly, the justice heard.

Julie Sargeant, who had trafficked to the airport nearby Stratford-upon-Avon with Mr Morse, told the justice she stayed inside the hunt"s blue Land Rover since she ""didn"t wish to get involved"".

She pronounced Mr Morse, a highway guard with the hunt, had followed the aircraft to the margin to confront Griffiths, parking the Land Rover ""right up to the nose"" of the gyrocopter.

Miss Sargeant cried as she told the jury: ""He (Mr Morse) went and stood in front of the gyrocopter, to the left palm side of it.""

She told the justice that she as well had stood in front of the aircraft after she was beckoned out of the car by Mr Morse but she began to move afar when the engine started. Mr Morse, however, stood fast, she said.

""He was only stood there, he was only stood there,"" she told the court.

She added: ""I can recollect thinking, "Oh right, they are going to begin it." Not at any point did I ever think there was any genuine danger.

""I only unequivocally longed for to go. I thought tempers competence get a bit sore. It (the engine) proposed and afterwards it changed brazen and strike Trevor.

""I"m not wakeful of anything after that, alternative than perplexing to get an ambulance and someone to come to me.""

Miss Sargeant, who described Mr Morse as ""Mr Nice Guy"", pronounced the 15-minute wait for for puncture services to reach the remote airport ""felt similar to an eternity"".

On Tuesday the jury was shown an edited video of the event in between Mr Morse and Griffiths - held on camera by the man who had brought the fuel to the airfield, Peter Bunce.

Gareth Evans QC, prosecuting, told the court: ""The knife edge of the back propeller cleaved Mr Morse"s head from tip to bottom.

""Unfortunately it additionally dramatically private a apportionment of his brain and threw it afar from him. Mercifully genocide was instantaneous.

""The assign contend that this man, the defendant, is criminally probable for this death. We contend that he is guilty of manslaughter, we contend that he caused Trevor Morse"s genocide by his own sum negligence.""

Griffiths, of Wiltshire Close, Bedworth, north Warwickshire, denies the charge.