Angelika Trial: I Can Still Hear That Scream

A “loud and horrid” scream was heard on the day that Angelika Kluk was last seen alive, the murder trial was told yesterday. Leigh Brown, 47, was washing the windows of her high-rise home which overlooks St Patrick’s Church in Anderston, Glasgow, when she heard a woman’s scream “as though someone was being grabbed”.

“I can still hear that horrible noise,” she told the High Court in Edinburgh. Mrs Brown said she and her husband Andrew, 46, had just taken a break from washing windows and cleaning blinds on Sunday September 26 last year. The windows of their flat in St Vincent Terrace were still open as she watched the start of the EastEnders omnibus on TV.

“It was female. It definitely was female as it was quite high,” she told advocate- depute Dorothy Bain. Her husband Andrew said he also heard the loud scream and went to the kitchen window. He said he thought it was just before 2pm, although EastEnders did not start until 3.05pm. The Browns could not see anyone in the street and did not know where the scream came from.

The trial has heard how Angelika was last seen by worshippers at St Patrick’s that afternoon – in company with the man accused of raping and murdering her and hiding her body under the floor of the church. Peter Tobin, 60, denies all the charges, and attempting to pervert the course of justice by travelling to London and giving hospital staff false details.

The court was yesterday shown seven still photographs taken from CCTV cameras at Edinburgh’s St Andrew’s Bus Station. The photos of a man in a light jacket carrying a white plastic bag and holding a mobile phone to his ear were recorded on September 26, just after 9.20pm.

Detective Constable Linda Serplus, 34, of Strathclyde Police family protection unit, said she recognised the images. “It is a man called Peter Tobin,” she told the trial. Bus station administrator Alistair Gibson, 49, said a number of buses left Edinburgh for London between 9pm and 10pm each night.

Earlier, the trial heard a policeman had dressed as a nurse to identify Mr Tobin. The accused was in a London hospital pretending to be ill, the court was told. But police in Scotland had contacted colleagues in the Metropolitan Police to say they were looking for Mr Tobin.

Constable Alan Murray, 37, told how he was sent to a ward in the National Neurology and Neurosurgery Hospital in Queen Square, London, last September 30 – the day Angelika’s body was taken from the church.

A patient who had told doctors he was a pipe fitter called James Kelly was taken to a side room and Mr Murray went to speak to him there. The court heard that Mr Tobin greeted him with the words: “I knew you were police.”

Questioned by defence QC Donald Findlay, Mr Murray revealed the reason for Mr Tobin’s remark. “That would imply he had seen you before,” said the lawyer, to which Mr Murray agreed.

He then told how he had first taken a look at Mr Tobin: “I had nurses’ stuff on as there were no civilian jackets I could put on.” The trial heard that Mr Murray – in uniform – then went back to Mr Tobin who said: “I knew you were police. I am relieved you are here.”

When the policeman asked: “Are you” Mr Tobin interrupted and said: “Peter Tobin, you have been looking for me.” When Mr Tobin was cautioned that he did not have to say anything he replied: “Kent Police and Met Police are looking for me for murder. I am surrendering myself to you PC 227EK by name of Alan.”

“Remarkable, like something out of a bad television play,” commented Mr Findlay. Mr Murray told him: “Those were the words he used which I wrote directly down into my pocket book.”

Earlier, consultant neurologist Dr Nick Losseff, 43, described hospital tests on Mr Tobin. He said that he handed the man over to police because he thought his symptoms were “fictitious”. The doctor told the trial: “I was struck by the fact that he made very poor eye contact with me during interview.” He said that was unusual in hospital patients.

Angelika had been staying at the chapel house attached to St Patrick’s Church and working as a cleaner to help finance her language studies in Gdansk. Mr Tobin was helping out there as an odd job man.

The murder charge alleges that Mr Tobin attacked Angelika between September 24 and September 29 in St Patrick’s Church, or elsewhere, gagging her with cloth and tape, tying her hands, raping her, battering her with a piece of wood or something similar, and repeatedly striking her with a knife.

It is alleged that he then hid the body under the floor of the church in an attempt to defeat the ends of justice. In a “special defence” read to the jury Mr Tobin admits having sex with the Polish student, with her consent.

A further charge – which Mr Tobin also denies – alleges that he told Glasgow police his name was Patrick McLaughlin, gave a false date of birth and address, and that he travelled to London and gave staff at the National Neurology and Neurosurgery Hospital in Queen’s Square, London, another false name.

The trial continues.