Elias Morgan is one of two men currently on trial accused of shooting dad-of-three Lenny Scott dead outside a gym
The man accused of shooting a prison officer dead in a “revenge attack” has told a court that “no one’s an angel”. Former HMP Altcourse guard Lenny Scott died aged 33 after being shot six times by a gunman in a hi-vis jacket outside a gym on Peel Road in Skelmersdale on February 8 last year.
Elias Morgan and Anthony Cleary, both of Edge Hill, are currently on trial at Preston Crown Court charged with his murder. The former is alleged to have been the man who pulled the trigger in an “act of retaliation”, which came nearly four years after the officer exposed an illicit relationship between the then serving prisoner and a female prison guard.
Dad-of-three Lenny, from Prescot, was said to have refused a bribe of a £1,500 in return for not reporting a phone which Morgan illegally held behind bars and contained evidence of this affair, leading to the 35-year-old, of Highgate Street, apparently warning him “I’ll bide my time, but I promise I will get you”. Cleary, aged 29 and of Smithdown Lane, is meanwhile accused of assisting the gunman by sourcing a van and e-bike used during the shooting.
Morgan continued to give evidence to the court for a second day yesterday, Thursday. Under cross-examination, his co-accused’s counsel Tim Forte KC accused him of having called his client following the shooting and stated that he had “just done someone”.
During the afternoon session, Alex Leach KC, prosecuting, went on to ask him why his co-accused had suggested that he had killed Mr Scott. Morgan replied: “You’ve got to look at Cleary’s motives.”
When Mr Leach put to him that Cleary was “saying it because it’s true”, he responded: “It’s not true. I haven’t killed Lenny Scott.”
Morgan was then questioned over his account that Mr Scott had approached him while he was behind bars and given him the phone number of an unnamed man whom he wanted to get in contact with. He previously recalled being “a bit off” with the officer as “people might get the idea that you’re grassing on someone”.
Mr Leach suggested that it was “extremely important to him not to be seen as a grass” and “something he would take very seriously”, with Morgan replying: “Yeah, I know myself. I don’t s*** on other people. I wouldn’t s*** on people for any reason.”
Returning to what was said by Morgan during his evidence in chief, Mr Leach said: “There came a stage where he suggested that you help him contact someone out of the prison, and you didn’t want to help him. You fobbed him off effectively. There came a stage when you woke up, and he was stood over your bed.”
Morgan reported that Mr Scott had accused him of “chatting s***” at this stage, with Mr Leach continuing: “You backed him off, not physically but verbally. You said that’s not true. He backed off you, and that was it.”
The defendant agreed but said “he only backed off because off what I said”. When asked whether this was the “high point of any dispute between him and Lenny Scott”, Morgan told the court: “That’s the only dispute that’s ever happened.”
Questioned over whether he had ever threatened the deceased after he had seized the phone from him, he said: “I never spoke to him. I never woke up when the cell got searched. I said, ‘f*** it, I’m not arsed’.”
Accused of being “threatening about his family”, Morgan claimed that he “didn’t know nothing about his family” and went on to say: “I never approached him. In prison, if you make any threats, there’s a nicking for it.
“If you threaten an officer in any way, there’s a charge for it. It doesn’t matter what you say, it’s a charge. If he’s nicked me for the phone, if I made any threats to him, I’d be placed on report.
“You’re trying to make it into a big thing. He was trying to locate people outside, the people he’s round. I didn’t even know he had kids. If I’d threatened him in prison, I’d have a nicking through my door. I’d be moved.”
Asked why Mr Scott would lie about the threats, Morgan said: “I can’t tell you Lenny Scott’s motive. But there must have been something, because I never threatened him. You’re asking me the mind of Lenny Scott. I’m not a mind reader.”
Morgan alleged that Instagram messages sent by Mr Scott had shown him offering parcels of drugs for “snapping another guard in half”. He added: “That’s from his Instagram himself. He’s messaging prisoners. Where’s the high standing, noble person? Lets get this straight, no one’s an angel. We’ve seen evidence from Lenny’s own Instagram. It’s Lenny’s own words, speaking to multiple prisoners.”
When Mr Leach asked him whether his case was that Mr Scott had “pursued a devious, upsetting course of lies for reasons he can’t explain”, Morgan replied: “I can’t answer for his motives. What’s being said is not true. You can see from his own Instagram messages.”
Mr Leach previously told the jury of eight men and four women during the prosecution’s opening: “The murder was, the prosecution says, an act of retaliation. The prosecution says that, once you have heard the evidence, you will be sure that, at the very least, Elias Morgan orchestrated Lenny Scott’s murder, recruiting Anthony Cleary to assist him in doing so.
“Moreover, the prosecution say that, when you have examined the fine detail of the evidence, you will be sure not only that Elias Morgan is guilty of murder by organising the killing of Lenny Scott, you will be sure that it was he who pulled the trigger himself. For his part, Anthony Cleary played a supporting role.
“Acting on instructions, he delivered the van containing the electric motorbike used by the gunman to a housing estate close to the gym. Moreover, he knew that he was delivering the van and bike so that they could be used by a gunman who intended to kill Lenny Scott, or at least to cause him really serious harm.
“The evidence, when examined in detail, reveals a powerful image, one in which Elias Morgan, driven by a desire for revenge and reliant on Anthony Cleary for his assistance, planned and executed the murder of Lenny Scott. Both men, the prosecution say, are guilty of his murder.”
Both defendants deny murder, while Cleary has also pleaded not guilty to a second count of manslaughter. The trial, before Mr Justice Goose, continues.
