A 15-year-old boy accused of killing an elderly man has told so many lies he has “difficulty keeping track”, a murder trial has heard.
The child allegedly racially abused 80-year-old Bhim Kohli, as well as kicking and punching him as he was on the ground, while a girl, then aged 12, filmed the attack and laughed.
Mr Kohli suffered a spinal injury and fractured ribs in the alleged assault in Franklin Park, Braunstone Town, near Leicester last September, and died in hospital from his injuries the following day.
The youth denies Mr Kohli’s murder and an alternative charge of manslaughter at Leicester Crown Court, while the girl, now 13, denies manslaughter. Neither defendant can be named because of their ages.
Jurors were told the teenager lied to police and had to “change his story” because he did not know the girl had filmed parts of the alleged attack.
He had previously said he and Mr Kohli had been in a “tussle” after his slider fell off and the elderly man had tried to grab it, causing him to fall to his knees before he slapped him out of “instinct”.
Prosecutor Harpreet Sandhu KC told him the story about the tussle was “not true” because in a video clip of the slapping assault found on the girl’s Snapchat account, the boy was not wearing any sliders.
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Mr Sandhu reminded him he had claimed he and Mr Kohli “went for it [the fallen slider] at the same time”, and both ended up “pulling” on it during which Mr Kohli “somehow” ended up on the ground.
But he told the defendant his story about one slider coming off “is not true” as in the video of the attack, “we can’t see you wearing any sliders”.
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The boy, who looked towards the public gallery where his mother was sitting several times while he gave evidence on Thursday, denied the allegations.
Mr Sandhu said “there was no tussle for the slider, was there?”, but the boy insisted there was.
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The court heard the boy had lied in a statement to prosecutors a month earlier when he said Mr Kohli hit him with the slider.
Mr Sandhu told him he was “making things up” and was struggling to “remember the lies you have told … you are having difficulty keeping track of your lies.
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“You have given us two different versions of what Mr Kohli did with the slider. Have you given us two different versions because you can’t remember the lies you have been telling?”
The boy said: “No.”
The trial continues.
