Robbery accused 'was intimidated and scared'
A man accused of taking part in a robbery during which a shop owner was pistol-whipped told police he had agreed to act as a lookout because he felt 'intimidated and scared', a court heard.
Zubair Khan, aged 27, was arrested moments after victim Zemnako Azad Salih, owner of Sam Euro Style in Whitmore Reans, was robbed of £2,700 and his van keys outside his store on December 13 last year.
Khan, of Seymour Road, Oldbury, is accused along with Ashley Haughton, 27, of Great Hampton Street and Isaac Frazer, 33, of Newbridge Street, of robbery, possession of an imitation firearm, and possession of an offensive weapon. All three deny the charges.
At Wolverhampton Crown Court on Monday a transcript of a series of interviews police conducted with Khan the day after his arrest were read out to the jury.
During the interviews Khan told officers he had been asked to act as a lookout by two black men he had never met before.
Khan told police he had agreed to take part because he thought it 'was only a small job', the court heard.
Referring to the interview transcripts, Miss Cathlyn Orchard, prosecuting, said Khan told officers he felt 'intimidated and scared' when two black men he had picked up in his car asked him to act as a lookout.
"He said he felt he could not say no or they would hurt him," she added.
The court heard that Khan told police he picked up a friend and three other men in Whitmore Reans shortly before the incident occurred.
He said he was in the area to try and sell the Vauxhall Astra he was driving. "The black guys said they were going to do a job," Khan is said to have told the police.
"They said I was just to keep lookout and drive the car."
As the interview progressed Khan told police that he and two of the passengers got out of the car to get a pizza, leaving the two black men in his Astra.
"I didn't know they had weapons," Khan added during the interview. "I felt scared and wanted to get away."
When asked why a machete was found in his car after Mr Salih had been attacked Khan told police that 'it's going to have been the black guys who left it there'.
Extracts from Frazer's interview were also read to the court. He told police he had been to score drugs at a house off Newhampton Road and became 'puzzled' when 'a guy covered in blood' grabbed him in the street.
The court heard that Haughton gave a 'no comment' interview, although in a statement read to police by his solicitor he denied any involvement in the robbery.
The trial continues.
