After launching a cowardly attack from behind on a man who was sitting outside a Coventry pub, Adrian Brock stabbed his victim twice to the stomach and abdomen.
And when he was arrested Brock said he was disappointed Ryan Casey had survived – and that when he had served his sentence he would hunt him down and ‘finish the job.’
But Brock (45) of Lower Precinct, Coventry, has pleaded not guilty at Warwick Crown Court to attempted murder, although he has admitted an alternative offence of wounding with intent.
Prosecutor Matthew Farmer told the jury: “What the prosecution say is that he, in a fit of violent jealousy, went to the Holyhead pub where Ryan Casey was sitting having a drink and attacked him from behind and then stabbed him twice to the abdomen and stomach, causing life-threatening injuries.
“The prosecution say this was clearly with an intention to kill, and as a result Mr Casey lost some of his bowel.”
Mr Farmer said Brock had been having an affair with Mr Ryan’s wife, Laura, but they had had a row, and she was with her husband at a table outside the pub in Holyhead Road, Coventry, when he was attacked.
The two men had known each-other for about ten years because both had worked at Co-op Logistics in Keresley where Brock was Mr Casey’s team leader on the day shift.
They got on very well, and Brock sometimes gave Mr Casey, who had married Laura in 2012, a lift home from work.
But in October 2015 Laura told her husband she had met up with Brock for a drink – and he became suspicious because she had been staying out on other occasions, and he found a picture on Facebook of the two of them hugging.
He angrily confronted Brock, threatening to knock him out and telling him to stay away from his wife, but in the November he quit his job because he was worried about seeing Brock there.
The couple were still living together at that time, but just before Christmas that year Mr Casey decided to move out.
They got back together the following month to give their marriage another go, but that only lasted until March when Laura declared that she loved Brock, and Mr Casey moved out again.
But over the following few months she was occasionally in contact with him, saying she had made a mistake and complaining about Brock.
He would not arrange to meet her, but they did bump into each-other on two or three occasions at his local, the Holyhead.
On Sunday October 2 last year Laura sent Mr Casey a text asking to meet up for a drink, but he made an excuse and instead went to the Holyhead that afternoon, drinking with a friend.
At about 6.30pm he went outside for a cigarette and saw his wife, who had had a big row with Brock, arriving with a female friend – and he was ‘quite abrupt’ when she asked why he had not wanted to meet her.
But he later went back inside and apologised for how he had spoken to her, at which she began crying and walked away, and he then joined her and her friend at a table outside.
“He had been there for about five minutes when, without any warning, he was kicked and hit to the back of the head three or four times. This was Adrian Brock just attacking him in a rather cowardly fashion from behind,” commented Mr Farmer.
“He stands up and turns to face his attacker. Then he sees Adrian Brock begin to throw what he believed was a flurry of punches at him. But in fact Brock had this large knife and was stabbing it into his abdomen.
“Adrian Brock then just walked away from him, and he recalls being told by someone else that he had been stabbed, and he lifted his jumper up and saw blood.”
Mr Casey was rushed to hospital where he underwent emergency surgery for life-threatening injuries.
“He was lucky that, due to the skill of the surgeons, his life was saved,” said Mr Farmer.
As the police rushed there, officers saw Brock in the street near the pub, waving his hands to attract their attention.
“As they pulled up, he took out a knife and held it up, then threw it down on the ground and walked towards the police car, and was told to get down on the ground.”
Brock responded by telling them: “I flagged you down. I’m not going to do anything. Yes it was me, I did it. I know it was wrong, but I had to do it. I have my reasons.”
He was arrested for wounding, but told on arrival at the police station that he was being arrested for attempted murder, he said: “I thought you’d say that. I wanted to kill him.”
Brock said he was ‘disappointed’ when he was told that Mr Casey had survived, because he thought he’d done enough, and in his interview he said on about ten occasions that he had intended to kill Mr Casey.
He told officers he had walked from his home with the knife in his pocket with the intention of stabbing him to kill him, adding that he did not do it to slash, but to kill.
“He said he had wanted to get Mr Casey for a long time. He said that once he gets out of prison he will hunt down Mr Casey and finish the job,” Mr Farmer told the jury. The trial continues.
