Innocent Jodie ‘knifed to death by drug thugs’
A GIRL Scout was stabbed to death by drug dealers embroiled in a ‘pathetic’ turf war, a jury heard yesterday.
Jodie Chesney, 17, was knifed in the back in front of her boyfriend in a park.
A jury at the Old Bailey heard her murder was the ‘terrible but predictable consequence of an all-too casual approach to the carrying – and using – of knives’.
Jodie’s family wept in court as they listened to details of her death – while her alleged killers, aged 16 to 20, sat in the dock.
Crispin Aylett, QC, prosecuting, said Jodie had been sitting with her boyfriend Eddie Coyle, 18, and others at the park in Harold Hill, East London, on the evening of March 1.
Suddenly, two youths emerged on the scene, making no noise – so Jodie would not have seen or heard them.
Mr Aylett said: ‘Eddie Coyle says one of the two males was noticeably taller than the other. Eddie saw this taller male swing his right arm in the direction of Jodie’s back. Jodie screamed. The two males ran off, noiselessly, disappearing into the darkness from which they had come.’
By the time an ambulance arrived, Jodie was bleeding heavily and showing no signs of life. She was pronounced dead on the way to hospital.
Mr Aylett told the court that A-level student Jodie was a ‘beautiful, well-liked and fun’ young woman who had nothing to do with drug-dealing and was unlikely to have been the intended target of the stabbing. He said: ‘The drug-dealing world is one of turf wars, rivalries and pathetic claims for “respect”. And when drug dealers fall out, they do not take their problems to the police.’
Manuel Petrovic, 20, Svenson Ong-akwie, 19, and two youths, aged 16 and 17, who cannot be named for legal reasons, all deny murder.
The case continues.