ELLIOTT: NEIGHBOURS FOUND DYING MEN AFTER LATE NIGHT SHOOT-OUT

A sleeping woman was woken by gunshots and found two dying men slumped outside her block of flats, the Old Bailey heard today (mon).

Sharon Elliott said she tried to help one of the victims by putting him in the recovery position, even though she feared ‘he wasn’t alive’.

She had heard screaming and shouting outside her property in the early hours of November 9 last year.

The court heard cocaine dealer Jayson Hassan, 28, and henchman Lee Wallace, 25, were gunned down in Strang House, Britannia Row, Islington, north London.

It is claimed they had gone to collect Hassan’s two guns and some money owed to him by former school friend and drugs ‘runner’ Daniel Wilson, 28.

In a statement read to the court Mrs Elliott said: ‘I was in bed with my husband when I was woken up by three or four loud noises that sounded like gunshots.

‘I went to my front door and could hear screaming and shouting, but couldn’t tell what they were saying.

‘After that, there was complete silence.

‘I went to the balcony and could see nothing – it was still silent.

‘I looked down, and directly below me I could see a figure slumped down in the corner, and shouted ‘hello, are you alright?’

‘He didn’t answer.

‘I thought he must have been shot, so I went back into my property and told my husband to call the police.’

When she went downstairs she came across Mr Wallace’s bloodied body.

‘His breathing seemed laboured and he didn’t speak – he had a mobile phone clutched in his hand,’ she said.

‘I then heard someone from above me shout that there was another person lying on the other side of the yard.

‘I could see he had stopped breathing, so I put him in the recovery system.

‘But I think we knew he wasn’t alive.

‘The other injured guy was also making a rasping sound and having trouble breathing.’

Miriam Zoabir, who lives on one of the top floors of Strang House, said she was woken at around 4am by a ‘popping noise’ which she initially mistook for fireworks.

‘I immediately heard somebody screaming,’ she said.

‘I got up, opened my blinds for a clearer view, and looked out.

‘I saw a person on the opposite side of the street, running down Britannia Row.

‘I assumed it was a male, and thought he was wearing a hoody – it was dark clothing, possibly grey.

‘I just went out on to the balcony and there was another woman there, shouting that somebody had been shot.’

The court has heard Wallace died instantly, while Hassan died from his injuries the following day.

Wilson, 28, is said to have recruited his Muslim-convert uncle Wayne Wilson, 42, and a third man Rodney Morrison, 43, to help him carry out the late night revenge attack.

Wilson had allegedly fallen out with Hassan over a £3,000 debt.

The dealer is said to have repeatedly threatened to kill Wilson in a string of text messages and voicemails, if he did not return the cash and the guns, which had been hidden in a neighbour’s garden.

On the night of the shootings, Wilson had been due to return two handguns.

Prosecutor Crispin Aylett QC said both men had been ‘picked off’ by two gunmen who had been laying in wait for them.

‘This was the terrible end game in the falling out between two drug dealers,’ he said.

Daniel Wilson, of Lichfield Road, Bow, east London; his uncle Wayne Wilson, of St Phillips Road, Preston, Lancashire; and Morrison, of Lancaster Road, Stratford, east London; each deny two counts of murder.

The trial continues.