Woman trying to stop attack on mum and baby ‘murdered with bottle’
A GOOD Samaritan who tried to stop a mother and baby being assaulted was murdered by the attacker with a broken wine bottle, a court heard yesterday.
Alison Wilson, 36, was passing in a taxi when she saw Stephen Duggan rowing with the woman and got out to try to ‘calm’ the situation.
When Duggan punched the woman, Miss Wilson’s friend Anthony Tomlinson also got out of the taxi, asking what was happening, the jury heard.
Duggan replied, ‘What are you f****** doing poking your nose into my business?’, and smashed a wine bottle over the 43-yearold’s head. He then thrust the jagged glass into Miss Wilson’s neck. She died six days later.
Duggan, 28, admits wounding Mr Tomlinson and Miss Wilson’s manslaughter, but the prosecution refused to accept his plea, saying he is guilty of murder.
Liverpool Crown Court heard mother- of- two Miss Wilson believed she would be able to defuse the confrontation. She and Mr Tomlinson were returning home in Widnes, Cheshire, on March 7, at about 11.30pm when they saw Duggan and the woman ‘tussling’ over the six-month-old.
Gordon Cole, prosecuting, said Mr Tomlinson asked the taxi driver to slow down and called out, ‘Is everything OK – what’s going on?’, before Miss Wilson suggested getting out ‘to calm things down’, Mr Cole said. The jury heard Duggan then punched the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons. Miss Wilson asked Mr Tomlinson to pay for the taxi, and he then came over, asking what was happening.
Duggan demanded to know why he was ‘ poking your nose into my business’, took four steps forward and struck him over the head with the bottle, before jabbing a shard into his cheek.
‘He was knocked to the floor, poleaxed,’ Mr Cole said. Duggan then ‘used the bottle as a weapon’ thrusting it into Miss Wilson’s face and neck ‘ causing her to stumble to the ground’, he added. The other woman fled with the baby, followed by Duggan. He was arrested hours later.
Mr Cole said the blows were ‘unprovoked … with such force and deliberation, it shows … he intended really serious harm’.
The court heard Duggan, originally from Runcorn, Cheshire, had been drinking with the woman when he became ‘argumentative and aggressive’ and tried to take the child, resulting in a ‘heated’ row.
He admitted assaulting her. He denies murder, wounding with intent, and assaulting the baby.
The case continues.