A man fatally stabbed a “peacemaker” who was trying to break up fighting and injured five other people when he went on a knife rampage outside a Cornish nightclub, a jury has been told.
Jake Hill, 24, had hidden a hunting knife with a serrated edge in a hedge before he went into the club and used it when disorder broke out as the nightspot shut, the court was told.
Michael Allen, 32, was killed in the early morning incident near the Eclipse club in Bodmin. Five others were stabbed but survived, Truro crown court heard.
Hill, from Bodmin, and two women, Tia Taylor, 21 and Chelsea Powell, 22, deny murder and an alternative charge of manslaughter. Hill also denies the other stabbings.
Mark Cotter KC, prosecuting, said: “The allegations against Jake Hill are that he carried out six assaults against six separate individuals.” Cotter alleged Taylor and Powell took part in the attack on Michael – but not on the other five victims.
The prosecutor said: “On the evening of 29 April 2023 these three defendants and the deceased Michael Allen and the five other injured parties were having an evening out at the Eclipse nightclub in Bodmin.” He said the club closed at 3am and the revellers, many of whom were intoxicated, went out into the street.
The three defendants and others in their group were trying unsuccessfully to get a taxi when down the road disorder broke out between different groups, the court heard.
Cotter said the defendants became involved in the fighting and Hill produced his knife and stabbed and slashed six people. The jury heard that one witness described it as a “knife rampage” that happened in “a matter of seconds”.
Cotter said none of the victims had done anything to Hill that could explain why they had been stabbed.
The prosecutor said: “Michael Allen became embroiled in the disorder and was trying to separate some of the parties.”
Hill, who was “angry and violent”, and the two women confronted Allen, who was unarmed, and he was stabbed by Hill in the abdomen, the blade causing a 12.5cm-deep wound. He suffered rapid blood loss and died at the scene.
Jurors heard Ryan Berger and Liam Phillips were stabbed in the groin, Rhiannon Tompsett in the thigh, Stefan Williams in the upper chest and, as he left the scene, Ryan Parsons was stabbed in the left temple.
Cotter said by the time Hill began struggling with Allen, Taylor and Powell must have realised Hill was armed with a knife and was wielding it. He said the women had voluntarily put themselves in that violent environment and were happy to participate in the violence, landing blows on Allen.
After the stabbings, the three accused went to Taylor’s home in Bodmin, where police arrived in the early hours. Hill was found in her loft, the prosecution said.
Hill also denies three charges of attempted murder and alternative charges of wounding with intent. In addition, he denies two counts of wounding with intent and alternative charges of unlawful wounding.
Taylor and Powell both deny murder, manslaughter and perverting the course of justice.
The trial is expected to last up to eight weeks.
