A 16-YEAR-OLD has described how her panicked friend told her to delete all phone contact she had with Shakilus Townsend after he was attacked.

The 16-year-old's police video interview from July 8 was played to the Old Bailey today (April 23).

Shakilus Townsend, aged 16, of Tanners Hill, Deptford, died after he was attacked on July 3 last year in Thornton Heath.

Tyrell Vito Ellis, aged 19, and Danny McLean, aged 18, both from Thornton Heath, and 18-year-old Andre Johnson-Haynes, from Croydon, are charged with murder. A 16-year-old girl and three 17-year-old boys who cannot be named for legal reasons also deny the charge.

The witness, who also cannot be named, was friends with the 16-year-old girl accused of the murder.

Shakilus had been seeing the accused girl but the prosecution alleges he was attacked after boyfriend McLean, also known as Tampah, found out about the relationship.

In her interview, the witness said: “She did mention she was going to get Shak set up because Tampah found out that she'd cheated on him.”

The friend added: “I said to her you shouldn't do that because Shak's innocent, he didn't know you had a boyfriend.”

But the accused replied: “It's not just because of that, it's because he punched up another bloke's teeth already.”

After the attack, the accused called her friend, telling her to delete all contact she had with Shakilus from her phone.

She said: “I could heard Tampah in the background saying 'my head's hurting, it's bleeding.'

“She said he'd been hit on the head with a baseball bat.”

The accused sounded “panicky” according to the witness.

After the friend found out about Shakilus's death she rang the accused again.

She said: “I was asking her if she did that thing I told her not to do.

“She said 'what thing, I don't know what you're talking about.'”

The friend asked: “Did you stand there and watch him get beaten up?

“She said 'no, I just walked away.'”

The friend told police the accused girl told her she had led Shak down an alley.

She said the boy knew he was being set up but was trying to call his friends.

The witness said later she had spoken to McLean on the phone who told her the accused girl had been arrested.

She replied: “Good, I hope she gets the maximum sentence possible.”

And she told police McLean said “it wasn't meant to happen like that.”

She said: “He sounded like he was telling the truth – like he was upset about what happened, like he didn't mean for him to die.”

Earlier in the day, the court heard a statement given to police by Shakilus's mother Nicola Dyer.

She described how she moved to Lewisham in 2005 with her children and that Shakilus was “growing up fast”.

Ms Dyer said her son had been in trouble with the law and had been convicted of a number of crimes, culminating in five months at a Young Offenders' Institution.

She said: “When he came out, I could see that he was really trying to make changes in his life.”

Ms Dyer said Shakilus was planning to study business at Bromley College before he was killed.

She said Shakilus was having fights with groups from West Norwood and she did not always know where he was.

But Ms Dyer said she was not aware of Shakilus being in any gangs.

All defendants deny the charges against them.

The trial continues.