News
Dealer Khan denies debt killing
Friday, 28 November 2008
Victim Leon Nelson
A CANNABIS dealer accused of stabbing a youth to death over a £250 drug debt has denied the killing, saying it was “not worth it” for the money.
The Old Bailey has been told that Moosa Khan, 20, plunged a knife eight inches into 22-year-old Leon Nelson’s stomach and left him to die on the South Lambeth Estate in Kennington.
But on Monday the accused said that although he had been selling cannabis nearby, he had not carried out the attack.
Khan told jurors that he and Mr Nelson would often supply each other with cannabis.
He said that around two weeks before Mr Nelson’s death on July 31 last year, he had given him £250 worth and had not yet been paid.
Asked by his barrister Ed Rees whether he had been so angry about the debt he wanted to stab Mr Nelson, Khan replied: “Over £250 it’s unnecessary, it’s not worth it.”
Khan also lifted the lid on the South London gang scene in which he claimed he and Mr Nelson both moved.
He said the area was divided broadly into Blood and Crip estates, based on the notorious gangs of Los Angeles – with gang members in Blood areas wearing red or purple, and the Crips wearing blue or green.
Describing himself as someone who used to live in the Blood area, but with “friends all over,” he said: “The older generation, they are all affiliated, and they are all friends, they all grew up together.
“But the new generation, they will just go and do something stupid, like shoot someone or stab someone to get the respect.
“They are more violent when they are at secondary school, in Year 10 or 11.”
Khan said that Mr Nelson was also a member of the Bloods, and feared going to the Crip’s South Lambeth Estate.
He said witnesses who placed him at the murder scene had grudges against him and wanted to make a deal with the police so that they would be let off for minor offences.
The defendant, of Portland Grove, Lambeth, denies murder.
The trial continues.
Email: newsdesk@slp.co.uk
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