A man has been found guilty of murdering the cousin of the world heavyweight boxing champion Tyson Fury.
Liam O’Pray, 21, was convicted on Friday of fatally stabbing Rico Burton, 31, during a brawl outside a bar in Altrincham in August last year.
He was also found guilty of wounding with intent by slashing and stabbing Harvey Reilly, 18, in the same incident during the early hours of the morning on 22 August.
The trial at Manchester crown court heard O’Pray used a seven-inch blade that almost completely severed a major artery in Burton’s neck leading to massive blood loss. Burton went into cardiac arrest and was declared dead in hospital at 4.35am.
Jurors were shown CCTV footage of a fight between the defendant’s friends and Burton’s family and friends at Goose Green, a courtyard of bars in Altrincham, Trafford.
A witness told the court that shortly after 3am “absolute chaos” broke out when O’Pray’s friend, Malachi Hewitt-Brown, was punched by Burton’s cousin Chasiah Burton.
Rico Burton then aimed a punch at Hewitt-Brown, before O’Pray stabbed the left side of his neck, the jury was told.
Reilly then began to attack the defendant, who was “indiscriminatingly waving the knife”, slashing him in the arm and the abdomen, before being punched and seemingly knocked out.
Reilly suffered a 14cm gaping wound to his chest wall, exposing his ribs, and a large wound to his left arm.
“All this happened within five to six seconds of Chasiah Burton punching Mr Hewitt-Brown. It was an extremely fast-moving incident,” said the prosecutor Michael Brady KC.
O’Pray had earlier been refused entry to a bar, and witnesses described his behaviour as “very erratic”.
The court heard cannabis, cocaine and ketamine were found in the defendant’s bloodstream, and he had three wraps of cocaine on him when arrested after the incident.
During the trial, O’Pray said he was “not a violent person” and claimed he was acting in self-defence. “I was just trying to stop punches and kicks. I was just defending myself, I was under attack,” he said.
After his cousin’s death, Fury urged ministers to do more to tackle knife crime: “UK government needs to bring higher sentencing for knife crime, it’s a pandemic and you don’t know how bad it is until it’s one of your own,” he said in a post on social media.
