The court heard how Mr Smith made desperate effort
The court heard how Mr Smith made desperate efforts to climb out of one of the rear door windows in slow moving traffic between junctions nine and 10 on the M25.
One motorist, Samantha Vigor, noticed Mr Smith haul himself out of the car ‘almost to his waist and make circular motions indicating she should wind her window down,’ said Mr Ellison.
Miss Vigor said he was shouting like a ‘frightened man’ and asking her to take down the registration number and call police.
But another rear passenger then pulled him back into the car.
Another motorist, David Hill, saw Mr Smith leaning out of the window and shouting.
Mr Ellison continued: ‘When he was alongside the man began to shout at him: ‘Call police and take a note of this number.
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‘His eyes were bulging and his whole demeanour was frantic.
The car was swerving about and there was a lot of movement inside.
‘As the car accelerated Mr Smith’s cap blew off.
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Later that day Mr Smith was sighted for the last time in Icelands in Islington when he tried to buy a fridge freezer with Pugh.
Mr Smith was either scared or trying to spoil the transaction and he shook so much as he signed the receipt that the salesman called his manager.
They walked out emptyhanded and it was the last Mr Smith was seen alive.
On December 7 Pugh later arranged for a cheque for pnds stlg 2,000 from Mr Smith’s savings to be deposited into his own Alliance and Leicester account.
And Pugh later bought a puffa jacket from a shop called Factory 2000 in the Angel, Islington.
Mr Ellison said on the same day Hastings police had started looking for Mr Smith after he failed to turn up and play the organ at his local crematorium the previous day.
Back in Islington Pugh was seen with large ‘wads’ of cash in various pubs including the Duke of Wellington.
Pugh was heard by people in the bar talking about his Jaguar parked outside.
It is alleged he told a friend he ‘should have been involved in the job because he made pnds stlg 125,000 out of it.
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The court heard that this was a reference to Pugh asking the pal several days earlier if he wanted to do a ‘tie up and baby sitting job’ for him for pnds stlg 10,000.
His friend told him that he did not want to get involved.
A witness in another pub heard Pugh telling someone on his mobile phone that ‘money was no object.
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Pugh was later seen with his girlfriend in the Jaguar, in Walworth.
The court was told by the morning of December 8 armed police had Halliday House under surveillance.
Pugh was seen to arrive outside the building in the Jaguar and then make his way up to the third-floor flat.
The Crown had alleged that Holden was present at the flat with Mr Smith while Pugh was out.
Earlier Mr Ellison said that both Holden and Pugh were staying at Halliday House at the time.
‘The Crown cannot say – between the Monday and the Wednesday evening when Mr Smith’s body was found – with precision when he was killed, or who did the act that actually killed him.
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He said Mr Smith and Pugh were ‘no strangers to eachother’ and no disguise was used at any time.
‘Had he lived he would have been in a position to identify Pugh and the others who held him as well as where he was held.
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The prosecutor added that the injuries to Mr Smith showed the killer was ‘trying to ensure that he did not make a complaint to the police which would lead to their arrests.
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The jury had heard how Mr Smith regularly played the organ at his local church, St Matthews, and for a firm of funeral directors.
‘You will hear that he is a homosexual,’ the prosecutor continued.
‘He may have consorted with younger men.
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Mr Ellison said that they were ‘not able to prove in any detail the nature of the relationship between Smith and Pugh.
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Yet the trial had heard how Pugh arranged young homosexual partners for Mr Smith.
A friend of Mr Smith, a Brian Fallon, saw him days before his disappearance, and he never spoke of going anywhere.
‘Fastidious’ Mr Smith kept a detailed note of his commitments from week to week and he was due to play the organ at two funerals at the Hastings crematorium on the Monday.
But he failed to turn up and a man with a deep voice called that day to say Mr Smith could not make it, the court heard.
Mr Ellison then told the jury how Pugh’s palm print was found on the inside of Mr Smith’s front door and on an Oxford English Dictionary on the bookshelf.
Holden’s prints were discovered on the wallpaper ‘there being no conceivable reason for him being down in St Leonards.
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When police finally forced their way into Mr Smith’s flat they found the curtains drawn but there was no sign of a struggle.
But a file containing his will, and a list of assets amounting to pnds stlg 108,800 among other documents including savings accounts, were later found in the boot of the Jaguar.
ends
