A 16-year-old British girl was kidnapped, raped and forced to take heroin and crack cocaine before being tortured and murdered in a brutal attack by a gang of six men, a court heard today.
Mary-Ann Leneghan, whose father Bertie is originally from Co Mayo, was told she was going to die after being abducted with a friend last May in Reading, west of London. She was found dead in a park the next morning with over 40 stab wounds.
The friend, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was shot in the head but "miraculously" survived.
The six men deny all the charges.
Prosecutor Richard Latham told Reading Crown Court the men shared joint responsibility for the attack which, he said, was prompted by the girl's alleged involvement in a previous robbery.
"They (the six men) had different roles but we say they were acting together as a joint enterprise to torture and kill these two women," Mr Latham said.
The prosecutor said one of the accused, Adrian Thomas, had gathered a group of five friends to take revenge on Leneghan and her 18-year-old friend because he believed they had set him up to be robbed for drugs, an act which had resulted in his being stabbed.
"Adrian Thomas believed Mary-Ann and or (her friend) had set him up for that robbery," Latham told the court.
"Adrian Thomas decided to come to Reading to get his revenge. He decided to get together a group of men, his five fellow defendants. They ... were armed with various weapons."
Mr Latham said that on the evening of the attack, the two girls were dragged from a parked car, bundled into the boot of another car and driven to a guest house in Reading.
"The six men took them to room 19 and for the next few hours they were sexually assaulted, raped .... and made to smoke heroin and crack cocaine.
"They laid towels on the floor, no doubt to ensure no blood got on the carpet. They were told they were going to die that night."
During the assault the girls were burnt with cigarettes and had boiling water mixed with sugar thrown at them. After the assault, they were taken to Prospect Park where a pillow case was placed over Leneghan's head before she was stabbed in the neck and head.
"(The other girl) was asked 'are you ready to die' and told that watching her friend being butchered would be her last memory," Mr Latham said.
All the defendants, aged in their late teens to early 20s, deny murdering Leneghan, the attempted murder of her friend and the kidnap, rape and grievous bodily harm of both teenagers.
The six defendants, all from London, are: Thomas, Llewellyn Adams, Michael Johnson, Indrit Krasniqi, Jamile and Joshua Morally.