Old Bailey hears gun victim Sharmaarke Hassan, 17, had 'survived previous shooting'
Wednesday May 5, 2010
By DAVID ST GEORGE, at the OLD BAILEY
JURORS heard this week of a string of local drugs gangs stabbings and shootings around the time of the murder of Sharmaarke “Sharkey” Hassan.
The 17-year-old, from Agar Grove, was with friends in Gilbey’s Yard in Chalk Farm when he was hit in the back of the head by a bullet.
Prosecutor Crispin Aylett, QC, told the Old Bailey that the former Acland Burghley pupil may not have even been the target for a revenge attack.
He died days later without regaining consciousness having been shot indiscriminately when he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
On trial are cousins Didi Parkes, 24, of Willesden Lane, Cricklewood, and Chen Shire, 21, of Carroll Close, Kentish Town, and a schoolboy, now 17, from Arlington Road in Camden Town – he cannot be named on legal grounds – who deny murder on 24 May 2008.
The boy recruited others “to do his dirty work” and get even after he was beaten up, say the prosecution.
Defence QC Brendan Kelly, for Shire, mentioned a series of violent crimes involving The Money Squad, The Muslim Soldiers and The African Nations Crew when he quizzed the reluctant Crown witness Ozan Diolek.
The QC said The Money Squad, of which Sharkey was a member, was “the most active gang in Camden” and guarded its own territory. He said Sharkey had survived a previous shooting on Hampstead Heath in 2007.
Another member was left on a life support after being blasted in the stomach in Girdlestone Walk, Archway.
Mr Kelly revealed that Mr Diolek had been attacked with hammers in Somers Town, and that associates of his had been stabbed in the leg and shot in the arm in Camden High Street.
Mr Diolek agreed that he had been arrested for supplying an undercover police officer with cannabis and cocaine in the High Street, but said he had “no idea” what lay behind the violent incidents.
“Just growing up in Camden is it,” said the QC.
The case continues.