Pub victim boasted he was hardman and flashed ‘gun wounds’
MURDER TRIAL TOLD OF HOURS BEFORE DEATH Witness told court accused claimed that he was ‘not someone to be messed with’
AN ALLEGED murder victim boasted of being a notorious hardman and showed off his “gunshot wounds” in a pub in the hours before his death, a court heard yesterday.
Alex Forbes, 25, was taking cocaine and singing karaoke in a Fife bar during a New Year’s Day drinking session, a jury was told.
Adrian Hynd, 51, is accused of murder and appeared at the High Court in Edinburgh for the first day of his trial.
He is alleged to have fatally stabbed Forbes after the pair met in Kirkcaldy’s Windsor Bar.
The court heard Forbes was a relative of the Kelbie family and told patrons he’d been shot twice and was “well-known” in Edinburgh.
Staff said Forbes had been “annoying” other customers and repeatedly asked people: “Do you know who I am?”
Bar worker Stephanie Ewan, 21, said Forbes told her, “Do you know what I can do to you? I can damage you”, when she asked him to leave at closing time.
She said Forbes earlier lifted up his shirt to show off a stomach wound. “It was just a scar,” she added.
Forbes had asked people to look him up on Google, she said, and recalled the word “gangland” coming up.
She’d seen Forbes and Hynd “chatting” but saw nothing of concern.
Shanice Huey, 25, was also working at the bar that night.
Defence advocate Mark Stewart QC asked her if Forbes had opened his shirt to display “war wounds” which he said came from gunshots. Huey replied: “That’s correct”. She added: “We did have to say to him to put it away.”
Stewart asked if Forbes claimed he’d been shot twice.
Huey said: “Yes. He was quite open about telling everyone who walked into the pub.”
Stewart asked her: “Did you understand he was from a hardy family from Edinburgh and was showing off gunshot wounds?” Shanice replied: “That’s right.” Forbes’s pal Mark Docherty, 24, told the court he’d gone to the Windsor Bar with his friend who was in “good spirits”.
The jury was told they had been drinking through Hogmanay, slept it off, nearly finished a bottle of vodka, then went out.
He admitted Forbes had a gram of cocaine and they had each taken some beforehand and again in the bar.
Docherty said he’d met Forbes through Mark Kelbie, now deceased, and Robert Kelbie, who were his pal’s relatives, and Forbes was “just out the jail”.
Under cross examination from Stewart, Docherty said he knew what an “enforcer” was – someone who used physical means to intimidate others.
Stewart asked if Forbes “was an enforcer” and the witness said: “No”.
Stewart later asked if Forbes had been “boasting about his association with people called Kelbie” in the pub and “telling people he was a gangster”. The witness replied: “No.”
Stephen Whyte, 25, played pool that night with Forbes in the pub. He told the trial of an exchange between Forbes and Hynd.
Whyte said Forbes had asked the accused: “Do you know who I am?” Hynd replied: “No disrespect big man, but I’ve got a name for myself as well.”
The court heard Forbes had convictions for serious assaults and racially aggravated assaults and had served spells in prison.
Hynd has convictions for drink driving, breach of the peace, and speeding.
Mechanic Martin Aitken, 20, had been at the bar with his partner. The jury heard that Hynd had told him he was “not someone to be messed with”, and could “pick up the phone and have someone to do his dirty business”.
Hynd is accused of assaulting Forbes, of Edinburgh, in Victoria Road, Kirkcaldy, on January 2, seizing his neck, punching him, headbutting him, repeatedly knifing him in the body and head and murdering him.
Hynd denies the charge and lodged a plea of self-defence.
The trial, before judge Lord Ericht, continues.
BAR WORKER ON FORBES SHOWING SCARS