Victim Anthony Littler (Image: PA)
Two brothers who made a “hobby” of attacking gay men during the 1980s murdered a civil servant by bludgeoning his brain with blunt weapons in an unprovoked street attack, a jury heard. Michael Stewart, 57, and Anthony Stewart, 60, were aged just 15 and 18 when they allegedly killed Anthony Littler on May 1, 1984. The attack was part of a spate of violence carried out by the teens – it is claimed- as they revelled in targeting lone homosexual men.
Mr Littler was close to his home in Finchley, north London, and following the assault, Michael Stewart allegedly called for an ambulance from a nearby phone box, but a search for an injured man was called off after he hung up. Half an hour later, Mr Littler was found by members of the public lying in a pool of blood in an alleyway, having suffered a “catastrophic” brain injury from being bludgeoned with blunt weapons. The identity of the first 999 caller had been unknown, but jurors were told Michael Stewart had since confessed to someone that he had “called the old bill”.
Read more: Horror as elderly woman found dead near school in Exeter
Read more: Disabled man brutally killed by his carer – body left to rot for 12 days
The alleyway in East Finchley where Mr Littler was found. (Image: PA)
Years after the killing, Michael Stewart then allegedly admitted his guilt to a girlfriend and even showed her the location where it happened.
John Price KC, prosecuting, told the Old Bailey jury the defendants’ younger brother Daniel, then aged 10, knew his brothers had made a “hobby” of attacking solitary men in public.
The brothers had also separately “confessed” to Daniel what they had done to 45-year-old Mr Littler, jurors were told.
Opening the brother’s murder trial on Monday, Mr Price told how Mr Littler had been a real ale enthusiast and had spent the evening before his death at a pub in Carshalton, Surrey, at a meeting of the Ponds Branch of The Society for the Preservation of Beer from the Wood.
Having travelled back to London, he arrived at East Finchley Tube station at 12.18am on May 1 and walked down a narrow alleyway, where he was attacked.
East Finchley station (Image: PA)
Resident Edward Dyer, who has since died, had been walking his dog and heard a loud shout which “sounded like a cry of pain”, jurors were told.
Around half an hour later, Annalieze and James Hainge found Mr Littler lying injured in the alleyway as they walked home from the station.
In a statement, Mr Hainge said he saw what he thought was a “bundle of clothes” before realising it was a man lying face down in what appeared to be a pool of blood.
Mrs Hainge ran to call emergency services from a phone box while her husband stayed with Mr Littler.
The victim had suffered two skull fractures and a “catastrophic brain injury” from which he died at the scene.
An appeal poster outside East Finchley Underground station in north London as Metropolitan Police de (Image: PA)
Mrs Hainge’s call to emergency services had been the second 999 alert from a public phone kiosk, jurors were told.
At 12.22am, an unknown person had called an operator and asked for an “ambulance – quick”.
He allegedly told her: “I can’t stop, just get an ambulance to East Finchley station, there’s a man hurt outside the station.”
London Ambulance Service recorded the caller saying the casualty was “bleeding heavily” before putting the phone down.
The call handler had noted the male seemed “abnormally concerned over the matter”, was “well spoken” and had a “young sounding voice”.
Tragically station staff searched the area and found no trace of a bleeding man so the incident was stood down, the court heard.
The statue of “Lady Justice (Image: PA Archive/PA Images)
Mr Price told jurors that given the timing of the call, the unknown person must have been there when Mr Littler was attacked.
He said: “He gave imprecise if not wholly inaccurate information about where Mr Littler was and then he put the phone down, rather than give the operator the detail she needed.
“The prosecution submits that 42 years later, the evidence now available shows that it was Michael Stewart who had made that first 999 call at 12.22am and then hung up without giving the operator his name or the information she needed.”
Mr Price said Michael and Anthony Stewart had been among a group of young males who attacked Mr Littler with “blunt force weapons” in the alley.
At the time of the killing, the defendants had been living at separate addresses in the East Finchley area, with Anthony working as a binman.
Both defendants had denied involvement and claimed to be elsewhere, with Anthony Stewart providing a “demonstrably false alibi”, Mr Price said.
The Central Criminal Court also referred to as the Old Bailey, on Old Bailey, central London. (Image: PA Archive/PA Images)
He told jurors: “You will hear that this was not the only time that Michael Stewart, Anthony Stewart and others associated with them used violence on a solitary man they did not know, in a public place.
“By the spring of 1984, it is alleged by the prosecution that for quite a while this had been a habit or hobby of theirs.
“It was something they enjoyed doing. They had begun by targeting men whom they thought might be homosexual men.”
Jurors were told the defendants’ younger brother Daniel would be giving evidence that he knew about their activities and that both brothers had separately confessed to what they did to the man in the alley.
Michael Stewart, from New Barnet, and Anthony Stewart, from East Finchley, have denied murder.
The trial continues.