Witness in Olivia Pratt-Korbel murder trial describes ‘worst screaming I’ve ever heard’

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A witness in the Olivia Pratt-Korbel murder trial has described hearing “the worst screaming I’ve ever heard in my life” after the nine-year-old was shot by a balaclava-clad gunman.

Several witnesses told police about hearing “terrible” screams after Olivia was shot by a masked man, alleged to be 34-year-old Thomas Cashman, at her home in Liverpool on the evening of 22 August last year.

On Thursday, jurors at Manchester crown court heard statements from witnesses who saw how the street “descended into chaos” when a gunman opened fire into the home of Cheryl Korbel and her three children.

A bullet passed through the front door, and through Korbel’s hand, before hitting her daughter, Olivia, in the chest.

A neighbour, Adele Maher, described seeing a man dressed in “all black from head to toe” chasing another man, from her bedroom window.

“He was running with an arm stretched out in front of him,” she told police. “Seconds later I heard another two loud noises followed by the worst screaming I’ve ever heard in my life. I think it was women screaming, hysterical, out of control. It threw me into an instant panic because I knew then something bad had happened.”

She added: “I could hear Chloe, my neighbour Cheryl’s daughter, on the phone to someone. She sounded distraught. She was saying: ‘Where are they? Where are they? She’s dying.’ I realised then that something must have happened at Cheryl’s house.”

Afterwards, another neighbour, Olivia Heffron, said she heard a “completely inconsolable” Korbel screaming “she’s dying, she’s been shot in the chest,” and begging people on the street for help.

“I have never seen anyone in such a state of distress like that before,” Heffron said.

A further witness, Libby Boylan, described later seeing a police officer carrying a little girl in what looked like bloodstained pyjamas out of the house.

Joseph Nee, a stranger to the Korbels who had burst into the family home while being pursued by the gunman, was also shot in the leg and torso but survived the attack.

While being chased by the attacker, Nee “sounded hysterical like he was about to start crying”, as he begged the man with the gun for mercy, shouting “please lad, don’t, lad,” said a neighbour, Andrew Telfer.

Nee ran up the drive to the Korbel home after seeing the door ajar. The gunman hesitated at the end of the driveway and lowered the gun, before chasing Nee into the house, the witness described.

Nee was “covered in blood and mumbling words” out on the street after the attack, Telfer said. Nee was picked up in a car and taken to hospital before police arrived.

Cashman, of West Derby, denies Olivia’s murder and four other charges – the attempted murder of Nee, wounding with intent to inflict grievous bodily harm on Korbel, and two counts of possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life.

The trial continues.

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