A man accused of killing Harold Hill carpenter Evaldas Svolkinas allegedly stalked him over several nights and murdered him trying to claim the nearly £1,500 he was owed, a court heard today.
Andrej Malinovskij, 44, of Pheasant Close, Victoria Dock, had only £4.65 in his bank account when he allegedly beat up his former employer, Wood Green Crown Court heard.
Mr Svolkinas, known as Elvis to his friends, was found drowned with head injuries in a stream on the Harold Hill / Noak Hill border in December 2012.
Automatic number plate recognition cameras and CCTV footage placed the defendant’s Renault Espace in the area of Mr Svolkinas’s Dorking Rise home in the early hours of three days in the weeks before the death on December 13, 2012. Mr Malinovskij’s phone was also traced to the same area.
Prosecuting, Edward Brown QC said: “This was a man who lived where you were that morning, who owed you money, who was stalked by a car that was the twin of yours.
“By his body was a roll of tape, that was probably used as a gag, that had your wife’s DNA on.
“It was you planning this murder on the 12th.”
Mr Malinovskij, through a Russian translator, replied: “No I didn’t plan his murder, I don’t have anything to do with it.”
The defendant, who pleaded not guilty to murder, claimed he was in the area picking up discarded items such as fridges, fish tanks and prams and dropping off business cards for his building firm.
Mr Brown continued: “You claim you travelled 30 miles that morning, at five and six o’clock, on the off chance you might pick up a pram or something similar, in the snow.
“You won’t accept it but you were going to abduct Evaldas that morning and beat him for your money. And that beating you were a party to killed him didn’t it?”
“That’s not true,” the defendant replied.
Mr Malinovskij was at the time trying to claim £1,430 from Mr Svolkinas’s business ELV Interiors. He was awarded the money shortly after the death and he returned to his home country of Lithuania with his car for Christmas.
His wife Julija Malinovskaja, 28, also of Pheasant Close, was charged with murder alongside Mr Malinovskij in September last year but prosecutors brought no evidence against her at trial.
The trial continues.
Read more:
Desperate plea for information from girlfriend of man found dead in Harold Hill stream
Brother of Harold Hill murder victim Evaldas Svolkinas says killers must face justice
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