An alleged killer told a jury he was not planning to flee the country to evade justice after police found him with his passport.
Adam Fletcher told Liverpool Crown Court his passport was in a coat pocket because he had taken it to a bank appointment, and said messages from his girlfriend telling him to “get out the country” were not calls for him to try to evade police.
Fletcher allegedly murdered Mr Stenson on Princess Drive on December 19 - only hours after the two met at a party there. After an argument between the two turned into a scuffle and they were asked to go outside, Fletcher is said to have grabbed a kitchen knife from inside the home before hiding it behind his back, pulling Mr Stenson towards him and plunging it into his side.
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Prosecutors say that knife wound inflicted “catastrophic” damage, going straight through Mr Stenson’s heart and causing him to bleed to death quickly. They also say Fletcher, 28, tried to dodge justice for days after the killing with the help of his then girlfriend, Susie Lee, ex Demi Walsh and best friend Nathan Finnegan.
Fletcher admits stabbing Paul Stenson but says he acted in self defence and feared his own life was in danger in the moments before he stabbed the dad-of-two. He stands accused of murder and of possessing a bladed article. Lee, Walsh and Finnegan are all accused of assisting an offender, while Lee also faces an additional charge of witness intimidation. The four deny all the charges and are currently on trial at Liverpool Crown Court.
The jury heard last week how Susie Lee sent a message to Fletcher after he stabbed Mr Stenson saying “I love you, I’m sorry, get out the country”. Yesterday afternoon, Fletcher said that message did not amount to Lee trying to get him to flee and said Lee, Finnegan and Walsh all wanted him to hand himself in and told him to do so in texts and phone calls.
He said he planned to do so but had needed to “get his head clear” and see his baby daughter before going to police. Instead of Fletcher handing himself in, police located him on December 23, four days after Mr Stenson died, at an address in north Liverpool. They later found he had a number of personal items, including a passport in his coat pocket.
Asked by Richard Pratt, QC, why he had the passport, Fletcher answered that it had been in his coat since an appointment with his bank and that it had never been taken out. He said he “could not remember the exact time [of the appointment] but it was a week before [the stabbing] happened.
Mr Pratt asked: “Were you thinking of using that passport to leave the country?” Fletcher replied: “No, not at all.”
Proceeding
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