Manchester-born Lee Rigby was stabbed six times and almost decapitated, witnesses told a court today.
Witnesses to the attack described how the father-of-one was murdered as suspects Michael Adebolajo, 28, and Michael Adebowale, 22, stood on trial at the Old Bailey charged with murder.
Saraj Miah, a witness who was seen talking to a shop worker on CCTV, said that after Rigby was run over on May 22, he tried to reason with the attackers before they pointed a gun at him.
In a statement he said: “I thought that the two black men with knives were going to kill him. I told them not to kill him. They did not listen to me.
“The black man in the passenger seat with knives in both his hands stabbed the fallen man six times in his chest.”
He added that two men then threw the body on the left lane of the road and he could not sleep for two weeks after the horror he witnessed.
As statements were read, Rigby’s widow fled from court in tears.
A statement from shopkeeper Ibrahim Elidemir was also read and described how he shut himself, his girlfriend and two customers inside his store when he saw one of the attackers brandishing a knife after the crash.
Another witness, Amanda Bailey described her shock at seeing the attack on the soldier, who she said looked ‘like a young man coming home from college’.
She said: “The car sped up and went straight towards the young man. He didn’t seem to mind the car or notice at all.”
After he was run over, she said that she thought he might be dead.
“I could see that his eyes were still open but they looked frozen. He wasn’t moving or making any noise,” she said.
She also said how she thought one of the attackers was reaching for a phone to call an ambulance but instead reached for a knife and attempted to decapitate him.
“He was using a lot of force to hack at the young man’s neck. The motion of his arm was that he was raising it up and bringing it down,” she added.
“The whole incident took about two minutes, but I can’t be sure. It felt like a lifetime.”
Adebolajo and Adebowale deny his murder.
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