The 'Mr. Asia' case Barmaid’s query got ‘electric reaction’

Press, 30 January 1981, Page 5

The 'Mr. Asia' case Barmaid’s query got ‘electric reaction’

NZPA Lancaster A Lancashire barmaid shocked three defendants in the “Mr Asia” murder trial when she jokingly asked them if they had been paid for the murder of a New Zealander. Martin Johnstone, the Court has heard. The three \— Johnstone s confessed murderer, Andrew Maher, his cousin, James Smith, who has denied the murder, and Smith’s friend Kingsley Fagan, who is charged only with drugs conspiracy — were stunned, until -they realised it was a joke, the ’jury was told. Maureen McKeown, a barmaid at a Preston pub, told police in a statement read out yesterday, that the three men had been- having a lavish celebration. Maher had ordered champagne, insisting on "the real thing” a~nd had paid 18 sterling (SNZ44) for two bottles of Moet .et Chandon with a 20 sterling (BNZ49) note. “I said to them, what are vou ' celebrating.” Mrs McKeown said “You haven t done that murder m Chorlej have you. • • ce fbrating after the big pay off - . The reaction was eiectric. Fagan, a Scotsman, aged -i, foT police later: "I nearly| • . myself, and Jimmy was the same. I said, let s get the hell out of here/ Smith, aged 28, told ■police: „ “I nearly . » fa But d Maher. the self-styled ’hitman. for the drug . syndP , rate laughed it off. He toia IS other two that to leave 'then would look suspicious ( Instead, they told Mrs ‘McKeown that it was ’ Kazan’s thirtieth birthday, i but he was “shy about it.” later they asked the mother ■of the bar stall if she was a P °Earlie°r ma Fagan’s counsel, ating part of- a statement a made by the for- ■ mer° Scots Guard sergeant j and veteran of Northern Ireland. ... —

In his statement made under caution after being! charged, Fagan is said to have told police he was "willing and prepared” to do anything with drugs oh behalf of the syndicate which had hired him as a courier. But Mr Lever said the phraje was “police jargon” and had never been used by the inarticulate Fagan. "1 have to suggest that that sentence was never spoiken,” he said in cross-exam-ination of Detective Chief 1 Inspector Jeffrey Meadows. I“1 must put it to you m ■round terms that that interview was not accurately re- ■ corded.” ~ . I The allegation was flatly 'denied by Mr Meadows, and the denial was echoed later bv two -other detectixes present when the statement W Mr m Lever told Detective Sergeant John Wright,. who made the notes at the interview and, according to his testimony, wrote down the statement verbatim as Fagan made it, that it was a i physical impossibility tor lanv normal human being to i write down a conversation | in longhand without abbre-1 Iviation as it was going on; | But the day gave the jury. isome light relief from the j gruesome recitation of the murder scene they heard the previous day from the Scat ments of James Smith. The trial judge, Mrs Justice Rose Heilbron, had to ask several times for translations” of testimony by two Scotsmen — friends of Smith and Fagan — as lawv e r s and journalists struggled to interpret their heavy Scots accents and use of slang! , ■ r • Both men, Gerard Keagan and' Gavin Leyden, told the Court that they had turned down attempts by Smith and’ Fagan to recruit them to the syndicate. ’ Mr Keagan described how he. Smith and Fagan had bungled efforts to get Australian visas through the Australian consulate in Edinburgh. When Smith told him he would be paid 3000 sterling (NZ$735O) for carrying “stuff” strapped to his body

beneath his clothes, Keagan said he had opted out. "I decided not to go. I de- ; cided that there may be' something valuable involved,” he told the jury. ‘ I suspected something to do with drugs.” Worried at first about telling Smith that he was not interested. Keagan had told the two men that the British | passport he had applied for) had not arrived. But when he learned the other two had been refused Australian visas he went ahead with his own application anticipating that it too would be turned down, giving him the perfect excuse tor not making the trip. Although he later told Smith' he would not go because his wife was against it, Keagan told Mr Lever in cross-examination that her had never told Fagan that he had "withdrawn from the ■venture.” “As far as I was concerned it just fizzled out,” Keagan said. Earlier, Mr Lever had told the jury that Fagan himself was "playing a waiting game” to get out of the syndicate after he had realised “I'd found something that was not in my line.” “I knew I had to stay with it until I could find a wav out,” Fagan had told police.

Gavin Leyden, who refused a request to help sei! 5000 sterling (NZ512,250) of cocaine in Scotland, will be cross-examined today. But the sixteenth day of the trial is expected to be spent in protracted legal argument in the absence of the jury over the admissibility of evidence against Briton Billy Kirby, one of the five men . charged here with Johnstone’s murder. The jurv has heard the testimony of 'more than 20 but there are about 140 still to be called. Kirbv’s father. William Kirby,' is the next majoi witness to be called to the stand. The Crown allege? that he burned a bundle of Hood-stained clothing brought to his Lancashire farm by his son.