One of the murder suspects accused of stabbing a man to death at a woman’s bedsit in York allegedly burnt his clothes afterwards in a bid to avoid detection, a court heard.
Jobie Tyers, 28, allegedly stabbed Indrit Mustafaj to death during a gruesome machete attack at a flat in Vyner Street, near Haxby Road.
Tyers and his co-accused, who can’t be named for legal reasons at this stage, are each accused of murdering Mr Mustafaj, an alleged drug dealer known as ‘Mustang’, and attacking and injuring the female tenant and another named man after bursting into the flat with their faces covered.
Tyers admitted that he and his co-accused had planned to rob Mr Mustafaj of cash in a “quick smash-and-grab” at Leeds Crown Court yesterday (Wednesday).
But he claimed it was his cohort who meted out the violence and the fatal stabbing as he looked on from the edge of the room.
Mr Mustafaj, from Bradford, was visiting the named woman’s ground-floor flat when the fatal stabbing occurred at about 7.15pm on 23 November, 2024.
Tyers and his co-accused are alleged to have burst into the tiny bedsit armed with a crowbar before using a machete to stab Mr Mustafaj several times. The fatal blow was a stab wound to his thigh which pierced an artery.
Nicholas Lumley KC, defence barrister for Tyers’ co-defendant, said that the female tenant, who suffered cuts and bruising, had testified that the man who carried out the violence was wearing a dark Berghaus puffer jacket.
Mr Lumley showed the jury CCTV footage from a shop in York, a day or two after the murder, which apparently showed Tyers wearing what looked like a similar dark jacket.
However, Tyers claimed the outfit in the footage was a tracksuit and that he wasn’t wearing a Berghaus jacket on the night of the incident.
Mr Lumley suggested that Tyers had burnt, or got someone to dispose of, the jacket he wore on the night after fleeing from the flat. Tyers denied this.
When Mr Lumley asked Tyers if he had a propensity for losing his temper and suggested he could easily “flip”, the defendant denied this and said he was “far from a violent person”.
A machete, which was said to be the murder weapon, was later found in a skip opposite the bedsit which was “forensically linked” to the “vicious” attack.
Tyers claimed it was his co-accused who had hidden the knife among leafy debris in the skip after the incident.
The court heard that Mr Mustafaj’s coat was stolen by one of the defendants. Tyers claimed it was taken by his co-accused.
Tyers said that after the attack, he was “very scared”, so he ran to his co-defendant’s grey Peugeot parked in the street “to get us out of there”.
He said his co-accused then drove them to the James Street travellers’ site in York but that neither he nor his co-defendant lived there.
‘Get rid of the knife’
When asked if he and his co-accused had gone to the caravan park because they considered it a “safe place”, Tyers replied: “No.”
Tyers claimed that when they drove into the travellers’ site, his co-accused hid the crowbar and then threw Mr Mustafaj’s coat over a wall after driving to the bottom of the site.
A male witness, who was in the front passenger seat of the Peugeot when it was driven to the flat but played no part in the attack, told police that Tyers, his friend, had asked him to “get rid of the knife” in a skip after he fled the scene. Tyers denied this.
The witness, who remained in the car during the attack and wasn’t charged with any offence, said that Tyers had told him that he had “just battered somebody with an iron bar”.
When asked if this was true, Tyers replied: “I know who battered who, but it wasn’t me.”
Tyers said his co-accused was “the first one in the house and cracked someone on the leg with the crowbar”.
He admitted they had planned to rob Mustafaj, whom he claimed was a drug dealer, on “the spur of the moment” because “cash was tight at the time”.
The male witness said that Tyers had planned the robbery because he was “looking to get £8,000 together” to buy a BMW car. Tyers denied this.
He said that Tyers had told him he was planning to “tax” Mr Mustafaj and “get some coke”, which was a reference to cocaine or crack. Tyers denied this.
When asked if he and his co-accused had told the male witness they were going to “rob some junkies”, Tyers replied: “That’s right. For the cash.”
Asked how his co-defendant’s blood ended up on the back seat of the Peugeot getaway car, Tyers replied: “The crowbar, I suppose.”
He said after they fled the scene, he asked his co-accused to drive him to the travellers’ site. They spent about 10 minutes at the caravan park, then drove to the house of a friend in York – the same man who gave evidence against him.
Prosecutor John Harrison KC suggested that by the time Tyers arrived at the man’s house, he had changed his clothes and was wearing shorts. Tyers denied this.
Mr Mustafaj, who was also said to be carrying a knife, suffered multiple injuries and later died from the fatal stab wound to his thigh.
Drug deal
Prosecutor John Harrison KC said that Mr Mustafaj was visiting the woman’s flat to allegedly deal drugs. They were about to leave the bedsit when Tyers and his cohort, both with their faces masked, burst into the property and attacked Mr Mustafaj, the other named man and the woman.
“It is the prosecution’s case that both defendants intentionally participated in the attacks on all three victims, including the fatal attack on Mr Mustafaj,” said Mr Harrison.
He added, however, that the prosecution was unable to specify which of the two defendants was the main aggressor and who delivered the fatal blow to Mr Mustafaj.
“We simply say that these were joint attacks carried out together,” said the prosecuting barrister.
Tyers and his co-defendant, both from York, are each charged with murdering Mr Mustafaj, but both deny the allegation.
They were also each charged with robbing Mr Mustafaj of money, which Tyers admitted but his co-accused denied.
In addition, they each deny intentionally causing grievous bodily harm to the other named man and the female tenant.
Mr Harrison said that Tyers, from Gate Helmsley, had admitted going to the flat with the intention of robbing Mr Mustafaj of cash but denied participating in the violence.
Tyers’ co-defendant denies any involvement in the robbery, nor any intention to rob Mr Mustafaj.
“Both defendants accept being present at the scene but blame each other for the violence that took place,” said Mr Harrison.
As well as the fatal stab wound to his right thigh, Mr Mustafaj suffered two knife wounds to his other thigh, a knife wound to the back of his knee and deep lacerations, described as “defensive wounds”, to his hands.
The other male victim was taken to hospital after suffering a broken thigh bone and stab wounds to his buttocks.
Defence barrister Sam Green KC, for Tyers, claimed that his client was at the bedsit simply “for the purpose of supporting (his co-accused)” in the robbery but that he didn’t intend nor mete out any violence.
The trial continues.
