Father accused of murdering man then flying to Jamaica 'knew nothing' about shooting, court told
A father-of-six accused of murdering a man in a car park then jetting off to Jamaica for months in fact flew out to see his poorly grandmother and had no knowledge of the fatal shooting, a court has heard.
Milton Williams, of Tipton, is one of two men on trial for the killing of Telford man Tyrone Dorsett in a car park in Short Holme, Birmingham, just after midnight on April 15, 2018.
Birmingham Crown Court heard on Wednesday that the day after Mr Dorsett was shot dead in the car park, Williams, 41, booked a flight to Jamaica.
Representing Williams in court, Mr Leonard Smith KC told the jury that the defendant's grandmother was gravely ill at the time of the shooting and that he had been looking at tickets to Jamaica for some time.
Having flown to the Caribbean he had been due to return two weeks later, but he did not board the return flight and instead flew back to the UK months afterwards, Mr Smith accepted on Wednesday.
Mr Smith asked the jury to "use common sense" in considering whether Williams is guilty of murder.
"You return from a family break in Jamaica, a few months after an incident of which you know nothing.
"You live your life, see your children, return to the same job, for more than four years.
"You're never asked about this incident you know nothing about. Then, out of the blue, you are arrested in September of 2022.
"You could not be expected to remember what you were doing on a given day four years earlier."
Mr Smith also told the jury that a glove containing the DNA of both defendants which was found in the car park could have had both sets of DNA because the men had been present at the same house on an earlier date.
"There is no direct evidence of Mr Williams doing anything at the scene of the shooting or even being there - or nearby.
"Mr Williams says he can't remember where he was on a random night more than four years ago, but he can remember where he wasn't - that's a very different thing.
"The prosecution say that a glove found near to the shooting has both his DNA inside and also that of Mr Sculley, implying, they say, that both have worn that glove at some point."
He told them that the men had known each other for some time before the shooting, that Williams had discussed buying cannabis from Sculley and that they had both been present at a house in Heathfield Avenue in Handsworth.
The DNA could have arrived on the glove through innocent means, said Mr Smith, who used "gardening" as an example.
The trial had earlier heard that mobile phones belonging to Williams and Sculley had 'met up' on the night of the shooting according to 'cell site' data used by the prosecution.
Mr Smith told the jury that such cell site data can be inprecise, "misleading" and can be affected by "traffic, line of sight, height", and that they could not be certain Williams was in the car park when Mr Dorsett was shot.
He told the jury: "This case is about putting the defendants in the car park.
"Can you be certain [Williams] was in the car park at the time of the shooting?"
Williams, of Grace Road, Tipton, and co-defendant Damaine Sculley, 30, of Greenfield Road in Great Barr, both deny murder.
The trial continues.
