Admiral Duncan manager was beaten and kicked by gang says prosecutor

THE tragic fatal moments which claimed the life of popular former Soho bar manager David ‘Cinders’ Morley were described to an Old Bailey jury this week.
The 37-year-old was one of the victims of a ‘happy-slapping’ gang of thugs responsible for a night of horror on the South Bank of the Thames.
A schoolgirl booted the already stricken and defenceless Mr Morley using his head “like a football”.
Mr Morley, known as Cinders by his friends, managed the Admiral Duncan pub in Soho and was lucky to survive the nail bombing by David Copeland in 1999.
The homophobic and racist Copeland, now serving three life sentences, killed three customers there and maimed scores of others.
Mr Morley was working at The Birdcage pub in Chiswick at the time and lived-in. Last October boredom led a gang of five men and a schoolgirl – then 14 – to get their thrills from launching vicious attacks on strangers in the area of Hungerford Bridge, said prosecutor Richard Horwell.
Mr Morley was one of the eight men they targeted in five separate incidents, Mr Horwell said.
He said: “This is a case which is depressing as it is alarming.
“The lives of the six defendants held such little interest that they set on a plan to use violence for its own sake,” Horwell told the jury.
He said their “indiscriminate violence for their own pleasure” was at times linked to robbery of wallets and mobile phones.
Victims were punched, kicked and stamped on. “Weapons were not carried. Weapons are hardly necessary when you have an advantage in numbers,” said Mr Horwell.
Between 2.30am and 3.30am the gang hunted the area seeking out their prey on October 29.
The final victim, a jobless man sleeping rough under an arch near Waterloo Station, was filmed on a mobile by the schoolgirl as he desperately tried to fight off his assailants, it was claimed.
Mr Morley and his friend Alistair Whiteside, 30, were on a park bench in Jubilee Gardens, after leaving the nightclub Heaven off The Strand, when they came under attack.
Moments earlier the gang had left their first victim, walking home from his job at the Old Vic, injured and shocked. The pub manager suffered five broken ribs, a ruptured spleen and more than 40 other injuries to his body and head.
He died in hospital 17 hours later.
Mr Whiteside, who has also severely beaten, told the court he went back to the hospital later “only to be told that minutes before my arrival David had died”.
He recalled: “As I was in conversation with David I was aware of a group walking past and there was some sort of exchange.
“They spoke first, something like ‘you alright?’ or ‘hello’.
“The next thing I knew I had been either kicked or punched very hard to the side of the face and I was thrown to the ground.”
Mr Whiteside, a regular at the Admiral Duncan, said he tried to protect himself as he was punched and kicked repeatedly. His mobile phone and £20 were taken from his pocket.
He said he watched Mr Morley lying slumped against some railings.
“As he was sat there a girl ran up and kicked him in the head like you’d kick a football or rugby ball. She swung her right leg back and kicked him very hard, maybe two or three times.”
Mr Whiteside told the jury that the girl wore large hooped earrings.
The six accused, from south London, deny murder, conspiracy to cause grievous bodily harm with intent and conspiracy to rob. The jury was shown CCTV footage of the accused.
Lee and the schoolgirl were seen with hooded tops, and the girl filming the final attack on a mobile phone.
The trial continues.