A WORK "colleague" of the Carlisle security guard who is accused of murder had no idea a car he travelled in belonged to the missing Annan man Paul Taylor, a jury heard.

Marcus Goodfellow, 20, a fellow security worker with Jack Crawley at the city’s Cumberland Infirmary, has started giving his account of the day his co-defendant asked him to go with him as he took the car to Appleby.

They began the journey on the morning of October 19 last year, but it ended in Langwathby when 20-year-old Crawley crashed Mr Taylor’s Vauxhall Corsa.

Goodfellow denies “assisting an offender,” by helping Crawley to move the Corsa while knowing his co-defendant had committed a serious arrestable offence.

Barrister Peter Byrne questioned him at Carlisle Crown Court.

Confirming that he lived with his mother and sister in Carlisle, Goodfellow said that he previously lived in Gilsland. In October of last year he was working alongside Crawley as a security guard at the Carlisle hospital. 

The job involved him having an industry licence and no convictions.

Before April of last year, he did not know Jack Crawley, he said. They had no friends in common and his association with his co-defendant had been through his security work in Carlisle, he told the court.

Goodfellow confirmed that he allowed the police full access to his phone, providing the PIN code.

Mr Byrne asked the defendant whether he had anything to do with organised crime groups. “No,” said Goodfellow. “Did you consider him [Crawley]  to be a friend, a work colleague, or something else?” asked Mr Byrne.

“A work colleague,” replied the defendant.

He said that in October of last year he had not heard of Paul Taylor, the hospital catering manager allegedly murdered by Crawley. “Did you know anything about his initial disappearance?” asked the barrister.

Goodfellow said he did not.

Mr Byrne continued: “When was the first time you had any suspicion that Jack Crawley might be involved in Mr Taylor’s disappearance?” Goodfellow said: “I saw a [missing appeal] poster at The Cumberland Infirmary.”

“What was it about the poster?” asked Mr Byrne.

Goodfellow said: “I saw the car.” He said he recognised the car as the one he had travelled in with Crawley to Langwathby on October 19. The jury were shown an exchange of phone messages between the two defendants.

Just after 8am, on October 18, after Goodfellow finished his night shift at the hospital, Crawley asked his colleague to go to his home, sending him a note of his address at Sheehan Crescent, Carlisle.

The exchange included a reference to the video game Grand Theft Auto.

“Was that message code?” asked the barrister, a refence to Crawley’s claim that he used the game to send Goodfellow coded messages about crimes they were to be involved in.

Crawley said the message was not a code.

Crawley was calling him, trying to get him to go to his house, he said. He refused to go, telling his colleague that he was unable to.

Moving on to the events of October 19 last year, the day after Mr Taylor died, Mr Byrne asked Goodfellow what his understanding of the planned trip to Appleby was when Crawley asked him to go with him that morning.

“There wasn’t much understanding at all,” said Goodfellow.

He knew only that they were taking a car to a friend of Crawley’s in Appleby and that the person was going to sell the car.

The jury were shown a message Goodfellow sent to his mum about the journey, in which he told her it would be “a car trip – a quick one.”

He agreed to go, said Goodfellow, because Crawley offered him a cannabis joint, and he was bored.

Mr Byrne asked about the standard of Crawley’s driving. “Poor,” said the defendant, who felt concerned about his safety. When Crawley crashed into a kerb, said Goodfellow, he became concerned that the car was not his co-defendant’s.

He felt that Crawley did not want to stay with the Corsa (pictured) after the crash.(Image: Cumbria Police photo)

Goodfellow recalled that his co-defendant did mention somebody dying and he told Crawley to “shut up” otherwise he would hit him. “He’d been talking rubbish for the last hour and I was sick of it,” he said.

He could not recall telling the friend who gave them a lift back to Carlisle to not tell anybody about what happened, he said. Nor did he tell him not to take them to the police, as that witness had earlier suggested.

Mr Byrne will continue questioning Goodfellow, of Greystone Road, Carlisle, tomorrow. Crawley also denies attempting to murder a man in York several weeks after he allegedly murdered Mr Taylor.

Crawley remains remanded into custody while Goodfellow is on bail.