Huddersfield shopkeeper Gurmail Singh was pinned down and battered with bottles of wine
Gurmail Singh
A GANG battered Huddersfield shopkeeper Gurmail Singh to death with bottles of wine in a botched robbery, a court heard.
Five men plotted to steal from the 63-year-old at Cowcliffe Convenience Stores on Cowcliffe Hill Road on the night of February 20, a jury at Bradford Crown Court was told yesterday.
When Mr Singh tried to resist the four who had entered the shop, they snatched bottles from the shelves and bludgeoned him repeatedly in the head.
He died in the early hours of the following day.
Opening the prosecution’s case, Adrian Waterman QC said: "Gurmail Singh did not meekly hand over his property – his hard-earned money – and, when he resisted the robbers, they used serious violence, grabbing the nearest weapon to hand which happened to be bottles of wine he sold in the shop.
"He was hit on the head. In other words, this case is about a robbery gone wrong in just the sort of way anyone would realise a robbery such as this might go wrong."
Mr Waterman told the jury how evidence from an expert in bloodstains suggested the shopkeeper had been hit at least five times with "considerable force by a heavy, short object".
He said a forensic pathologist had concluded that there were six lacerations to Mr Singh’s head.
The prosecutor said it was logical to believe that the victim was hit with a minimum of six blows.
The gang escaped with a handful of cash, sweets and cigarettes.
After the killing, two of them tried to go to see a film at the cinema and two went to a restaurant.
All five were later seen drinking together on the street in Springwood – not far from the Sikh temple where Mr Singh used to worship.
The five accused of murdering Mr Singh are Umare Aslam, 20, of Coniston Avenue, Dalton; Muawaz Khalid, 20, of Blackmoorfoot Road, Crosland Moor; Shoaib Khan, 18, of Calton Street, Hillhouse; Nabeel Shafi, 18, of Park Hill, Bradley; and Rehman Afzal, 18, of Jacinth Court, Fartown.
All five are also accused of robbery. The jury heard yesterday that three have denied the robbery charge, but Afzal and Shafi have pleaded guilty.
All five deny murder.
Khan, who was not in the shop at the time of the robbery, has admitted a separate charge of assisting an offender.
But Mr Waterman said the robbery was a joint enterprise. He said all five must have known there was a strong chance of serious violence being carried out against Mr Singh. They were all, therefore, guilty of his murder.
"They were in it together," he said.
