Neasden man on trial accused of killing Danny O’Shea in Custom House
Danny O'Shea was stabbed to death - Credit: Archant
Kevin Richards, 33, is one of 10 men in the dock at the Old Bailey
A Neasden man was part of an armed mob that killed an innocent teenager in a revenge attack organised by a sports agent with links to Ashley Cole and Jay Z, a court heard today.
Kevin Richards, 33, of North Circular Road, promised to pay a gang who were sent to the scene to track down the culprits and teach them a lesson by Christopher Nathaniel, 40, the Old Bailey was told.
After arming themselves with baseball bats and a knife, the 10-strong gang headed to the scene in Custom House, east London, by minibus on December 2, 2011.
Within hours, Danny O’Shea, 18, who was not connected to the mugging, had been stabbed to death yards from his front door, it is alleged.
Jurors heard claims that Nathaniel took the law into his own hands after his business partner and flatmate Paul Boadi, 35, was robbed of his BlackBerry mobile phone.
Nathaniel founded the NVA Entertainment group in 2005 and brokered a deal last year allowing the footballer to open a branch of US rapper Jay-Z’s 40/40 restaurant and bar chain.
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The attack was plotted after Boadi was robbed by a group of seven youngsters in the same street where the killing was to take place around a week earlier.
Unaware they had got the wrong man, one of the group boasted about the attack on Twitter the same evening, posting: ‘The element of surprise is such a useful thing.’
The gang is said to have consisted of brothers Paul, 33, and Andrew Johnson, 35, O’Neil Wareham, 30, Ferron Perue, 24, Nugent Rowe, 29, all from Harrow, David Hylton, 47, from Bloomsbury, and Scott Marius, 45, from Maida Vale.
The 10 men accused of murder and conspiracy to commit grievous bodily harm deny the charges.
