Yahoo News Murder suspect's parents had chippy tea and web searched son's name day after he went to Portsmouth
The parents of a murder suspect ordered a chippy tea the night after they allegedly helped him travel from Liverpool to Portsmouth. Mark Sharpe, 49, and his partner Melanie Smith, 47, are currently on trial along with four other defendants charged in connection with the murder of Nyle Corrigan, the particulars being they helped their son Connor Smith - accused of being one of gunmen - travel down to the south coast where he then went on to Spain two weeks after the shooting.
Mr Corrigan, 19, was shot once in the back when two gunmen waited for him by the side of Boode Croft in Stockbridge Village at around 6.30pm on November 12 2020. Three other men - Martin Wilson, 37, Jamie Coggins, 28, and Anthony Llewellyn, 25 - have joined Smith, 26, in the dock after being charged with Mr Corrigan’s murder.
The four men are also accused of conspiracy to possess a 9mm Glock self-loading pistol with intent to supply, while Sharpe’s partner and Connor Smith’s mum Melanie Smith, 47, is also accused of assisting an offender. Richard Wright KC told the jury of six men and six women that the prosecution’s case was that Wilson and Connor Smith were the gunmen who carried out the shooting but were supported by Coggins and Llewelyn “who were both fully signed up to the plan”. The prosecutor said: “Together, we say, those four men are all responsible for his murder.”
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The trial heard today, Tuesday November 12 that on November 27 - the day after the pair had allegedly helped their son travel to Portsmouth - Melanie Smith spent the morning searching the web. Mr Langhorn, the prosecution’s junior counsel, and Merseyside Police Detective Sergeant Christopher Burrows said she made a web search at 7.35am looking for the Merseyside Police home page.
Around two hours later she made a web search for her son’s name and around a minute later searched for “Merseyside Police”. Later the same day, at around 3.24pm, she searched for the M6 toll. Four minutes later she received a confirmation email from the M6.
The court heard once she received this email she messaged her partner “jus paid the other one the M6 toll one”. He responded: “Thanks forgot about that wat wud I do without you”.
Melanie Smith then messaged: “I’ve ordered chippy for 6.45 so go grave 1st I feel sick in my stomach over Connor can’t go on like this.” Sharpe responded: “I no but he’s stupid and not stupid if you no wat I mean, it’s out of r hands.”
The trial had previously heard Sharpe had messaged his son hours after Mr Corrigan was shot. He messaged shortly before 10pm “r u ok lad text your mother she’s worried about you, there’s been big shooting on the farm x”. The court heard Connor Smith called his mum the following day with the latter messaging Sharpe “Connor rang, he was out with his new bird x”.
The prosecution said in the following days Connor Smith moved belongings in bags from his flat in Reliance House in Liverpool’s city centre. The jury was played CCTV of Smith buying groceries and a SIM card from the Tesco Express on Old Hall Street at 1.30pm on November 14. The prosecution said Merseyside Police recovered Smith’s black Volkswagen Golf from Drury Lane in the city centre on November 16 and the following day he was circulated as wanted on the police national computer.
The prosecution said Smith and his co-defendants were at this time living at Alexandra Tower on Liverpool’s waterfront. The court previously heard on November 21 Coggins was initially arrested on suspicion of assisting an offender with Smith making a web search for “assisting an offender sentence” the following morning.
Mr Langhorn and Detective Sergeant Christopher Burrows told the jury that in the early evening of November 23 Sharpe messaged his partner: “He’s my son as well I know wat he does, I’ve told him to be careful cos I will go to prison for any of my kids.” Melanie Smith responded that her son’s uncle had spoken to him and he “said he was in his”. Sharpe responded: “Unless we go to his there is nothing else we can do unless he gets in contact with us. Leave it till weekend, i’ll go looking for him.”
The court heard on November 26 Connor Smith called his dad twice from a different phone number. Shortly before 2pm, Melanie Smith messaged her partner “make sure you concentrate driving as well properly going all the way there and bak x”. She then added: “Don’t forget to get the phone aswel please x”.
Sharpe then messaged his son: “Lad your mum said can you get the fone so it can wrap it up x.” The court heard Sharpe’s black Hackney taxi was then seen pulling up outside Alexandra Tower at 2.46pm. DS Burrows said Smith was seen leaving the tower “appearing to keep his head down and wearing a covid mask”.
The court heard he then got into the back of his dad’s taxi. DS Burrows said at 4.39pm Sharpe received an automated payment message for the M6 toll and then CCTV showed him refuelling the car at a BP garage in Chievely. At 6.44pm Melanie Smith sent him a message that said “don’t leave him till u now he’s safe x”.
The prosecution said Sharpe later made the return journey from Portsmouth back to Liverpool, while Connor Smith made the journey to Spain. The court heard his passport was used at the Hotel Mediodia in Madrid on December 10 while recovered phone data showed pictures of him in the Mijas area in January 2022.
During the prosecution’s opening Mr Wright told the jury that Wilson and Smith had travelled on foot to the “kill point”, wearing black face masks and gloves and with their hoods pulled up. He added once there the two gunmen “were in the area knowing that Nyle Corrigan was going to be present. They were waiting for him and this was a trap.”
Mr Wright told the jury that Mr Corrigan’s killers “exchanged words with their target before and after the shot”, that went through his spine and shredded an artery. They then left him to die before they used his Sur-Ron electric bike to escape.
The court previously heard that “the origins of the dispute lie with a man called Liam Cohen”. Mr Wright said Mr Cohen also lived on Little Moss Hey with his partner Kayleigh Donnelly and had previously been on good terms with Mr Corrigan but the relationship “had soured” because of an unpaid debt.
The court heard the dispute culminated on November 9 when Mr Corrigan sent Ms Donnelly a message calling her a “cheeky c***”. Mr Wright said the “minor debt” escalated and an “irritated” Mr Cohen had “brought in” distant relative Wilson.
The prosecution said a team of men later gathered around Wilson and went to Mr Corrigan’s house demanding to know where he was. Mr Wright told the court that the group said “Nyle was dead”, and when Ms Corrigan left to go to her granddad’s house they followed her in the car and shouted her brother “should not start something if he wasn’t going to finish it”.
Coggins, of The Spinney, Stockbridge Village; Llewellyn, formerly of Olivette Way, St Helens; Smith of Midway Road in Huyton; Wilson, of no fixed address, and Melanie Smith and Mark Sharpe, both also of Midway Road, deny the charges before them. The trial before Mr Justice Goose continues.
