James King, the pub landlord who Blake Fielder-Civil and a friend admitted to attacking during the course of a court hearing on Friday, agreed to accept a £200,000 bribe in return for not giving evidence in the trial and leaving the country, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard yesterday. That, in case you wondered, is the perverting the course of justice that Fielder-Civil and pals are now also accused of.
With the defendants having pleaded guilty at the end of last week, the prosecution quickly outlined the case against Mr Amy Winehouse et al. Prosecutor Sean Larkin said the defendants hoped that King refusing to testify and then disappearing would "effectively throw the case". Two other men, Anthony Kelly and James Kennedy, acted as middle men in the deal, and it was them that screwed it up for the justice perverting colluders - Kelly attempted to sell his story to the Daily Mirror who alerted the police.
Although Winehouse has been cleared of any involvement in the justice perverting, Larkin said that when the journalist who Kelly spoke to, Stephen Moyes, asked if Fielder-Civil's wife was aware of the deal, he said: "Who do you think is paying for it, of course she is".