Jaskaran Kang: Stab to the thigh delivered 'unlucky' fatal blow
An 'unlucky' stab wound to the leg which severed a major artery would have led to the death of a shopkeeper within minutes, a jury heard.
Jaskaran Kang bled profusely from the fatal three-inch thrust into his upper thigh which had pierced his femoral artery, said Home Office pathologist Dr Olaf Biedrzycki.
The injury would have required 'immediate expert help' to give the 24-year-old any chance of survival following the attack by masked intruders at his Brierley Hill flat last January, the court heard.
Dr Biedrzycki agreed under cross-examination that had the blade pierced half a centimetre to the left or right of where it had there would have been a 'real possibility' Mr Kang would have survived.
Quizzing him, Mr Paul Lewis, QC, representing defendant James Peake, asked whether the average person would know whether such a major artery would have been located there.
Dr Biedrzycki replied: "I suppose people should realise there must be some major artery that would supply blood to the leg but unless you picked up a book you wouldn't know where it was."
Mr Lewis suggested: "It has been a very unhappy chance that the blow cut the femoral artery and caused the catastrophic injuries you saw?"
The pathologist, who carried out the post mortem examination on Mr Kang, conceded it had been 'unlucky'.
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He told the jury that once the artery had been severed, there would have been 'a very short window of time to be saved' and that a fatal loss of blood in that location can occur 'in tens of seconds'.
Mr Kang had been asleep on the living room sofa of the first-floor flat in Stourbridge Road when the teenage gang kicked in the front door and demanded 'Where's the food' referring to cannabis, Birmingham Crown Court has heard.
The victim sold the drug, which was stored in the loft, from the convenience store on the ground floor which he ran with his brother.
One of the defendants, Reggie Salmon, had allegedly made at least two purchases the previous day.
Alex Clarke, a flatmate of the victim who was also involved in the cannabis racket, was forced at knifepoint to hand over the drugs stash.
After the intruders fled the scene, he found his friend on the landing outside bleeding to death.
Accused
In the dock are Dontay Ellis, 19, from Central Drive, Lower Gornal; Michael Cunningham, 18, of Coalway Road, Wolverhampton; Joshua Campbell, 18, of King Edmund Street, Dudley; and James Peake, 18, of Southgate Way, Dudley, who all plead not guilty to the murder on January 6 last year.
Also accused are Reggie Salmon, 21, of Stourbridge Road, Dudley, and Tyrone Johnson, 21, of Malthouse Drive, Dudley, who deny manslaughter.
Cunningham and Peake have admitted conspiracy to rob but the other four defendants deny the same charge, although Ellis has confessed to being at the scene.
The trial continues.
