I didn’t mean to kill victim, says gunman
AGUNMAN admitted shooting a man in front of Christmas shoppers in “an escalating war between rival drug dealers”.
Jamie Bridge blasted Christopher Jopson with a shotgun in Southport town centre at about 12.30pm, on December 21 last year.
Bridge, 22, of Wyresdale Road, Aintree, hit Mr Jopson in the back of the head and also injured innocent bystander Lee Armstrong, a bus driver caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.
He admitted wounding Mr Jopson with intent to cause grievous bodily harm, but denied attempted murder at Liverpool Crown Court.
Henry Riding, prosecuting, said: “As the town centre of Southport was thronged with vehicles and pedestrians ... Jamie Lewis Bridge chased after his intended victim, Christopher Jopson, down the very middle of Eastbank Street, one of the major thoroughfares in the heart of that town centre.
“As he did so, he took out a double-barrelled sawn-off shotgun, took aim at Mr Jopson and fired the shotgun once at him as he fled.”
Mr Riding said that some of the shot “peppered the back of his head”, but Mr Jopson “wasn’t that seriously injured”.
Bridge also admitted wounding Mr Armstrong, plus possessing a firearm with intent to endanger life and to cause fear of violence.
During the trial, which began on Monday, he said that he wanted to put Mr Jopson in hospital after he threatened him with guns and robbed and stabbed his underling.
Bridge was released from a two-year jail sentence in February 2017 for dealing heroin and cocaine and possessing a blade in public.
The dad-of-one said he moved to the resort to stay with his girlfriend, Julia Minicka.
He said Mr Jopson was “jealous” of the money he made from selling cannabis and threatened him, his mum and to shoot Ms Minicka.
Bridge said: “He said if I didn’t stop selling drugs in the Southport area he will blow her head off.”
He said that he heard Mr Jopson on the phone, “cocking” a gun, and he came to her flat with other men, asked for him and kicked the door.
Bridge said Mr Jopson worked with dealers who previously forced him to sell Class A drugs and whom he fell out with when jailed.
CCTV footage showed masked Bridge chasing Mr Jopson and firing the sawn-off shotgun in Eastbank Street, before fleeing on a bike.
Bridge said he tried to get close “so I didn’t injure anyone else around him”, then “aimed at his leg”. Asked about injuring Mr Armstrong, he said: “I regret it every day of my life.”
Mr Riding called Bridge a liar, saying that he was the person shown in CCTV images from the incident, until left with no choice.
He concluded that the evidence he intended to kill Mr Jopson was “utterly overwhelming”.
Charles Lander, defending, said that while what Bridge did was “disgraceful”, he did not want to kill Mr Jopson.
Summing up, he told the jury: “On the evidence, on everything you know about this case, you cannot be sure. If you cannot be sure, then the only proper verdict is one of not guilty.”