Friends tried to save schoolboy

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/7655711.stm

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Friends of murdered schoolboy Michael McIlveen tried to save him from being assaulted by a gang but were held back by a youth wielding a baseball bat.

A witness told the jury at Antrim Crown Court that he saw a crowd of 10 to 15 people running down an alleyway, where the teenager was beaten and kicked.

The witness, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said he and some other people locked themselves in a garden.

He said they tried to go back out but a "baseball bat came through (the gate)."

The witness told the jury he saw one of the defendants, 22-year-old Christopher Francis Kerr, of Carnduff Drive in Ballymena, in the alleyway and that he "sort of had his hand up his top" as if he was hiding something.

Shortly afterwards he heard someone shout "do it Merv."

Mervyn Wilson Moon, 20, of Douglas Terrace in Ballymena, has already pleaded guilty to a charge of murder and will be sentenced at the end of the trial.

The witness told the court that after the attack, Michael McIlveen was sitting up against a wall with a bloodied face.

He also said he thought Michael had a bottom tooth missing.

The witness said the teenager did not want an ambulance and managed to pull himself up and walk away.

During a cross examination by Richard Weir, QC, who is defending 19-year-old Jeff Colin Lewis, of Rossdale in Ballymena, the witness confirmed he had not heard anyone in the attacking group making sectarian comments and that he had not seen any weapons, other than the baseball bat that was used to break the garden gate.

The lawyer also put it to him that a pathologist's report would state that Mr McIlveen did not have any teeth knocked out adding: "It's an example of you being prepared to state something that is perhaps not right."

However, another witness, who can not be named for legal reasons, told the jury that he saw "a couple" of the gang carrying "pole shaped things... sticks and stuff".

He also identified Mr Kerr as being part of this group, but confirmed he did not know who the accused was at the time.

During a cross examination by Laurence McCrudden QC, who is defending Mr Kerr, it was put to the witness that Ballymena was "alive" with talk about the incident and his evidence had been "formed and contaminated by talk, gossip and rumour".

The witness rejected this stating: "It definitely has not."

The case continues.