Fife drug dealer tells of finding friend murdered

Duncan Banks’ body was discovered at his Dunfermline home

A self-confessed drug dealer told yesterday how he returned from a weekend break to find his “best friend” Duncan Banks lying murdered in his Dunfermline home.

David Docherty said he and his girlfriend Kayleigh Webster had become worried because Duncan, who was looking after his dog and dealing heroin for him, did not answer his phone.

He told a jury at the High Court in Livingston he had given Duncan 14 grammes of heroin for him to use and sell before they left the Fife town.

They feared Duncan had overdosed on the class A drug while they were away at a caravan park in Elie.

He said they tried unsuccessfully to break into Duncan’s council flat in Skye Road, Dunfermline.

Mr Docherty said: “Went to a neighbour’s house and borrowed a pair of ladders.

“I placed them under window, but because they weren’t secure I asked Kayleigh to go up while I held the ladder at the bottom.

“Kayleigh got the fright of her life. She started screaming hysterically.

“She was hysterical, saying he was covered in blood sitting on the chair.”

He said he was never paid money for the heroin he had given to Duncan but knew Duncan had a “stash place” in his bedroom where he hid drugs and cash.

Steven Thomson, 29, a prisoner at Perth, is on trial accused of murdering ‘Dunk’, as the dead man was known, and of possessing heroin.

He is charged with repeatedly hitting his alleged victim on the head with a blunt object or objects to his severe injury and robbing him of money, heroin, a wallet and a key.

He is also charged with possessing the Class A drug at Duncan’s home and elsewhere in Dunfermline between July 1 and October 13 2015.

He denies the charges and has lodged a special defence incriminating another man.

Under cross examination by defence counsel Derek Ogg, Mr Docherty claimed he had not lied to the police when he told them he had never had a key to Duncan’s house despite later admitting he had one but had given it back.

He said: “It was misjudgment of words. It’s not a lie at all because I couldn’t remember.”

Mr Ogg said to him: “A criminal associate of yours is found dead in his house with no signs of forced entry – do you not think it might be relevant to police to find out who could have got in there using a key?” Mr Docherty said: “If you say so yeah.” On Mr Docherty’s alibi, Mr Ogg said: “You told the police how cast iron it was – what stores you went to, what Cashline machines you used, date-stamped photographs on your phone or camera.

“Yet there were points where that phone was switched off completely by you.”

He replied: “I just wanted peace and quiet. We were away for the weekend.”

Pathologist Dr Ian Wilkinson, 35, who carried out an autopsy on Duncan’s body, told the murder trial the medical cause of death was “blunt force head trauma due to a blunt object or objects which have impacted against his head”.

He said it was possible a hammer could have caused the seven injuries, four of which fractured his skull and caused fatal underlying brain trauma.

Dr Wilkinson said there was no sign of any “defensive” injuries to Duncan’s arms or hands.

The trial, before Lady Rae, continues.

Duncan Banks, left, whose bloodied body was found by his friend David Docherty, right.