A law student who drove two men to Telford where they allegedly murdered a Shropshire man told a jury she did not know what they were doing as she waited in her car.
Kashia Allen told Wolverhampton Crown Court she had given her boyfriend, Gabriel Bhengu, and their friend Jabu Mbowane, a lift to Telford to pick up a coat on the night Neil Williams was killed.
The 22-year-old said she knew nothing about the robbery of Mr Williams in Stirchley on April 5 last year. Bhengu, 27, and Mbowane, 26, deny murdering Mr Williams.
Allen and the two men, all from Wolverhampton, deny murdering Sedgley man Andrew Owen on April 15 last year. They also deny committing a string of robberies in Shropshire and the Black Country.
Yesterday, Allen, who was studying criminal justice at the time of her arrest, told the jury she had Mr Williams’s stolen mobile phone because Bhengu swopped hers with it.
She said she did not know it was stolen until she was arrested for handling stolen goods.
Admitting she took the two men over to Telford, when asked why she thought they were away from the car for so long, she said: “I just thought they were taking ages talking.”She told the jury she was “cross” they had left her alone for so long.
Allen said the two men had nothing with them when they returned to the car.
Bhengu and Mbowane both admit robbing Mr Williams but claim they did not intend or know they had killed him.
Allen, who is co-accused of robbing Tracie Paxton on Telford’s Silkin Way on March 2, admitted she was in Telford on the day she was robbed but said she was shopping.
She told the jury she had left her car and keys with Bhengu and Mbowane.
She said the pair often got out of the car during journeys.
“Sometimes I thought they were involved in drugs,” she told the jury.
Bhengu’s case was re-opened yesterday where he returned to the witness box to deny having any involvement in drug use or dealing.
The trial continues.
By Kirsty Marston
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