‘I only hit the fence with the axe’

A father accused of murdering his son’s love rival told a court he only used the axe he brandished in the incident to damage a fence. Robert Grogan, 57, told the Old Bailey he would have done whatever was necessary to defend his boy from the people coming around to petrol bomb their home after a vicious break-up. Gemma Hodder had been dating Daniel ‘Joe’ Grogan, 20, but started seeing Jay Sewell who was murdered on 11 December last year….