Jo’s ‘killer’ walked of f without a care in the world
Witnesses describe horror
A LONER obsessed with the far Right walked away ‘as if he didn’t have a care in the world’ after murdering a Labour MP, a court heard yesterday.
Scot Thomas Mair appeared ‘peaceful and calm’ after shooting Jo Cox, 41, three times and stabbing her 15 times as she walked to the library.
One witness said the unemployed gardener slowly walked away from the dying MP ‘as if he hadn’t done anything wrong’.
His calm demeanour was described to the Old Bailey yesterday by witnesses who watched him rain down blows on Mrs Cox.
Others told how they screamed at the killer to ‘get the f*** off her’.
Tracy Bywood said she was clearing away lunch in a nearby care home when she heard women screaming and a man shouting ‘Britain first’.
She said that, as she watched, the attacker grabbed Mrs Cox by the hair ‘to drag her off the pavement’.
‘She went down on the floor like a sack of potatoes,’ the carer told the court.
‘It was awful to see a lady get such animosity towards her. It was horrible what I saw. He just repeatedly started kicking.’
Describing his demeanour in the aftermath, she added: ‘He were just so peaceful.
‘He were calm, as if he hadn’t done anything wrong.’
Mrs Cox was set upon as she walked to Birstall library in West Yorkshire for a weekly meeting with her constituents.
David Honeybell was waiting to meet Mrs Cox in the library when he heard gunshots and screams.
He said: ‘Voices were shouting, “leave her alone” or “get off her”.’
Describing the moment when he
‘Really loud popping noise’
says Mair, who is originally from Kilmarnock, Ayrshire, left, he added: ‘He just walked away with not a care in the world – he just walked away.’
Julie Holmes was working in a nearby shop when she saw Mair grab hold of Mrs Cox.
She said: ‘I saw a glint of metal and realised he was stabbing and not punching her.’
She described Mair stabbing Mrs Cox ‘all over’, including her neck, head and body.
‘He went to the bag, I thought he was going to walk away, and he came back up again,’ she said.
‘He walked back up to the lady, he appeared to straddle her, pointed the gun at her.
‘At that time I closed my eyes, heard a really loud popping noise.
‘I opened my eyes, he did something with the top of the gun, pointed at the woman again and fired again.’
Mair is accused of targeting the newly elected Batley and Spen MP because of her outspoken support for the campaign for Britain to remain part of Europe.
He spent hours studying the Nazi Waffen-SS, the Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist organisations in the days before the ‘politically motivated’ attack.
He also made internet searches for information about Mrs Cox, former Yorkshire MP William Hague, and Ian Gow, the last sitting MP to be murdered.
Mrs Cox was attacked on June 16 – a week before Britain voted on whether to leave the EU – within seconds of getting out of a car at the library.
The mother of two young children underwent emergency surgery in the street, but she could not be saved.
Mair, 53, of Birstall, denies murder, inflicting grievous bodily harm, possessing a firearm and possessing a dagger.
The trial continues.