Trial hears of fight intervention

The trial continues today of Mr Andre Khaled Shoukri (20), Westland Way, Belfast, who denies the manslaughter of a 23-year-old…

The trial continues today of Mr Andre Khaled Shoukri (20), Westland Way, Belfast, who denies the manslaughter of a 23-year-old Dublin-based tennis player, Gareth Parker, in Belfast last year. Mr Parker was struck by a car after falling to the ground and died three days later, on June 25th.

An RUC constable told Belfast Crown Court yesterday that Mr Shoukri told him that after leaving the Shaftesbury Inn with a friend, he saw this friend fighting with another man on the ground. "He said he had tried to break the fight up and then Parker tried to intervene.

"Mr Shoukri said he told him to `f . . . off out of the way" and had pushed him away. "The next thing he remembered was he looked round and there was a crowd round the man in the middle of the road."