A Grand Court jury heard Wednesday that Sven Connor, who was killed on 7 Dec. 2023, died in a “hail of gunfire” inside his home in East End after four men conspired to murder him.
Anstacio Rankine, 30, and Rolan Welcome Jr., 34, have both pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to murder Connor, and to a charge of possession of an unlicensed firearm. The two other suspects in the case have not been identified.
Following several days of legal argument, a jury of 12, in addition to four alternate jurors, was chosen on Wednesday morning, after which Crown counsel Barnaby Jameson, KC, of Red Lion Chambers in London, outlined the prosecution’s case against the two men.
According to Jameson, forensic evidence indicates that Connor was wounded multiple times, when shots were fired through his bedroom window as he lay in bed “unarmed and alone”.
Two separate guns used
Jameson told the jury of eight women and four men that two separate guns, one of which was a Glock 19 semi-automatic pistol, were used in the killing. Neither weapon has been recovered, he said.
The jurors heard, and saw in CCTV footage, that four men appeared to have been involved.
The jury was shown video footage – recorded just moments before the shooting occurred – of four individuals “huddled” together in the car park of the property next door to Connor’s home in Fiddlers Way in East End.
Jameson said this was evidence that the men planned, or “conspired”, to murder Connor, who would be riddled with bullets seconds later.
He told the jurors that, based on the trail of blood from the bedroom of the residence, Connor had been shot while in bed, had managed to open his bedroom door and begun to move towards his front door, before changing his mind and staggering though his living room, into his kitchen, where he was later found dead, “slumped by the oven”.
Up to 10 shots are believed to have been fired.
The bullets smashed through the bedroom window, piercing the mattress, and leaving holes in the interior walls of the house and the cupboards in the kitchen, the jury heard.
Jameson said the gunmen did not enter the house, “no doubt to mitigate the risk of leaving forensic traces”.
He said at least one of the two firearms used in the murder had been exchanged between the men as they gathered immediately before the shooting, when one of the two unidentified suspects passed a gun to another man, whom the Crown says was Rankine.
Rankine was present in court for the hearing, while Welcome opted to appear via video link from Northward Prison. Both men are remanded in custody.
Jameson told the jurors that Welcome, in his initial police interview, had said Connor was a friend of his and that he had been shocked by his death. He told police he had been with another friend at the time of the shooting, but later admitted that it was him on the CCTV footage.
Welcome “admitted to police that he acted as lookout”, the lawyer said.
Jameson added, “He said he had heard the gunshots but did not know who pulled the trigger.”
Both Welcome and Rankine lived in properties near Connor’s home in East End, the court heard.
‘Blazing argument’ before shooting
According to a witness – who will later give evidence anonymously – the lawyer said, a “blazing argument” had occurred between Connor and Rankine in a neighbour’s yard shortly before the shooting.
Jameson said Rankine, “amid expletives”, had been calling on Connor to come out from behind a small tipper truck in the yard. He said Connor replied, “You want me, you come to me.”
At this stage, Rankine “pelted” Connor with a rock, before Welcome intervened and pulled Rankine away, the jury heard.
After this, before returning to his home, Connor made a stop at a mini mart near his home. He was dead 20 minutes later, Jameson said.
He told jurors that “a fraction of a second” after the CCTV showed the men gathered in the neighbouring car park, “the peace of East End was shattered by the sound of gunshots”.
He said that while the Crown did not have to prove who fired the shots, it was likely that Rankine was one of the shooters, with one of the two unidentified suspects firing the second gun.
Jameson described a Glock 19 as a weapon that is not used for recreation. “It is light, it is accurate and it is deadly,” he said.
The Crown is scheduled to continue its opening statement in the case on Thursday.
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