An asylum seeker who followed a hotel worker to the train station at the end of her shift and stabbed her more than 20 times with a screwdriver has been convicted of murder.
Deng Chol Majek, who is from Sudan and claims to be 19 despite German authorities saying he is actually 27, celebrated after killing Rhiannon Skye Whyte on October 20 last year.
CCTV footage tracked him as he followed her from Walsall’s Park In n hotel, where she worked and he was living, to Bescot Stadium Station.
Majek stabbed Rhiannon ‘over and over again’ in a frenzied attack then ‘casually’ left her for dead to drink and dance with friends while emergency services rushed to the scene.
Rhiannon died three days later in hospital, having suffered a fatal brain injury.
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Majek, who was assisted in court by an Arabic interpreter, denied murder, claiming the figure caught on CCTV at the station and then visiting local shops to buy beer in ‘distinctive and identical’ clothing is not him, and that findings of Rhiannon’s DNA under his fingernails is wrong.
Prosecutor Michelle Heeley KC called his defence ‘ridiculous’ and ‘laughable’.
Jurors found Majek guilty of murder today after just two hours’ deliberations following a two-week trial.
Opening the case to jurors, Ms Heeley told them: ‘The person who attacked Rhiannon carried out a vicious and frenzied attack.
‘They meant to seriously hurt Rhiannon, to kill her, and they carried out the attack by stabbing her repeatedly in the head with an offensive weapon, a Phillips head screwdriver.’
She said Rhiannon had worked at the hotel for about three months, helping with things including cleaning and serving food, while the defendant was resident in room 309.
Ms Heeley added: ‘During the evening one of Rhiannon’s co-workers noticed this defendant. He seemed to be staring at Rhiannon and the women she was working with.
‘No one could recall any particular issue that would have caused him to act in that way. There had been an issue about some broken biscuits with some of the residents but nothing serious.
‘What is clear from the CCTV is that the defendant was hanging around the reception area, staring at Rhiannon throughout the evening.’
Hotel chef Louise Brittle told the court she saw a tall, dark-skinned man sitting at a high table, and wearing a silver top with the hood up, during her shift from 2pm to 10pm on October 20.
She said: ‘He was sitting relaxed in a high chair with one arm on the table and his foot on a bench… just staring.
‘He was staring towards the bar area. I came out of the kitchen and I noticed him straight away.
‘He was just staring through us … like eyes wide open and he just couldn’t take his eyes off any of us.
‘I said how scary it felt. The way he was staring at us.’
Shortly after, Majek changed into a distinctive jacket and sandals and then waited around the reception area where Rhiannon was.
Ms Heeley said: ‘CCTV tracks the defendant all the way. He followed her from the hotel and to the station.
‘He had been hanging around waiting for her to leave and waited until she was on her own before he followed her.’
Ms Whyte called a friend at 11.04pm, the court heard, and she was caught on CCTV at 11.08pm with Majek following two minutes later.
Majek then ‘closed the gap’ to 90 seconds and then 30 seconds as she reached the deserted platform at 11.13pm, the court heard.
Ms Heeley added: ‘It was then that the prosecution say that this defendant attacked her. Rhiannon had been talking to her friend.
‘But it went silent before (the friend) heard a scream, then another scream. The phone went dead at 11.19pm.
‘Shortly after that this defendant could be seen running back up the stairs from the platform. He had an object lit up in his hand – that was Rhiannon’s mobile phone.’
Ms Whyte’s friend, having heard screams, called the police, who contacted the hotel, who sent one of their employees to the station.
The train that Rhiannon had been due to catch pulled in at 11.24pm and the driver saw a figure slumped on the platform.
Ms Heeley continued: ‘The guard tried to help Rhiannon, as did the employee who had come from the hotel.
‘But sadly she was too seriously injured and nothing could be done to save her. She passed away on October 23, having never regained consciousness.
‘The defendant did not go straight back to the hotel, he went to a local shop and bought himself a drink first, arriving back in the hotel at 13 minutes past midnight.
‘In between the station and the hotel he had thrown Rhiannon’s phone into a river. Once at the hotel he was seen dancing and laughing, clearly excited about what he had done.’
In her closing speech, Ms Heeley told jurors: ‘The suggestion that it is anyone other than this defendant is just ridiculous.
‘He changes his shoes, from the bloodstained sandals to white trainers, and then he goes outside with his speaker and dances.
‘He is celebrating, his mood has changed from that prolonged scowl in the cafe before the murder to dancing and joy after the murder.
‘It is utterly callous.’
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