Joe Dix murder trial: Suspects played football after attack

It is alleged the victim Joe Dix was attacked by Benjamin Gil, 19, Hans Beeharry, 19 and Cameron Palmer, 18, in Vale Green, Mile Cross shortly before 7pm on January 28 last year.

Mr Dix was treated at the scene and taken to the Norfolk and Norwich University where he was pronounced dead at 8.06pm.

Three teenagers have gone on trial at Norwich Crown Court accused of murder while a fourth defendant, Yaman Uslu, 18, is accused of assisting an offender.

On Tuesday (January 10) the jury of seven women and five men heard extracts from police interviews with Uslu after he was arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender.

Uslu received a number of calls from Gil and the others, including at 7.17pm, 7.18pm, 7.19pm and 7.30pm, asking him to give them a lift to play football at Goals on Hall Road, Norwich.

He said: "They just kept asking if I could give them a lift.

"Ben called me and said 'we've got a game' and said 'we're going to be late'."

Uslu said they called again asking: "Please, we need a lift can you get us?"

The teenager said he could not but Palmer told him "just come and pick us up".

Uslu said: "They were pressuring me calling me - I felt pressured."

"I felt pressure, like I had to give them a lift that day."

He said they were acting like it was "my fault" and felt he "would be in trouble with them".

He said he was a "loyal person" and did not want to risk a "10 year friendship over a Goals game".

"The main reason I did the lifts, I was pressured.

"I was worried, they know me, my family where I live. I didn't want a problem.

"There was a worry if I didn't give the lift what might happen to me?"

After having taken them to Goals where they played football Uslu collected them at about 9pm when they asked for "one more lift".

He said "Trowse and Bowthorpe" were the "key locations they wanted to go" but insisted "whatever they done in these locations I didn't see".

Uslu drove the three defendants to a number of locations around Norwich and back to their home addresses over the course of the next few hours.

He stopped at Gil's address at 12.30am before leaving at 12.51am.

Police asked Uslu if he could say why he was stopped for more than 20 minutes but he told them he could not.

He insisted he had not done anything wrong adding "all I done was take them from A to B".

Uslu was asked whether he could tell police anything about the items being "carried by people in the car on that day".

He replied: "No."

They asked Uslu if he was asked to "get rid of anything that perhaps you thought was innocent".

Again Uslu repied "no".

Uslu was asked: "Did you do anything to help anyone get away with murder?"

He replied: "No".

Uslu was also asked whether he knew if any of the three defendants were involved in the murder.

He told police that as far as Gil was concerned he told detectives that he had "never know Ben carry a knife" adding that he was a "good kid"

He said: "I didn't suspect he was the sort to do that and then play football - it doesn't make sense to me".

In terms of Palmer he said "he didn't talk about him murdering anyone" adding that he was a "good friend" and the "last person I would expect to be involved in something like this".

In terms of Beeharry he said "we never talked. I've never heard him talk about the murder."

Gil, of Lefroy Road, Norwich, Beharry, of Bracondale, Norwich and Palmer, of Theobald Road, Norwich, have all denied murder.

Uslu, of Horner Close, Norwich, has pleaded not guilty to assisting an offender.

The trial continues.