A STOWMARKET man stabbed 86 times in his flat was killed by a fatal knife wound to his left lung, a jury heard.

Colin Adwent

A STOWMARKET man stabbed 86 times in his flat was killed by a fatal knife wound to his left lung, a jury heard.

Home Office pathologist Clive Bouch could not estimate the depths of the wound exactly as Matthew Pyke's lung would have collapsed, Nottingham Crown Court was told.

Mr Bouch said it would have been a matter of several centimetres, possibly up to 10 centimetres.

The weapon used was a single-edged bladed knife, up to 10 cms long and 1.5cms in width.

Dr Bouch detailed the injuries to 20-year-old Mr Pyke yesterday by using a body diagram that singled out each wound to his head, neck, torso and limbs.

He said it was a sustained attack and the injuries were widespread, rather than localised, that tended to suggest a ferocious attack.

David Heiss, 21, of Dauborn, near Limburg in Germany, denies murdering Mr Pyke, a former pupil of Combs Middle and Stowmarket High schools.

Dr Bouch went to the flat of Mr Pyke in North Sherwood Street on September 20 last year and said Mr Pyke was lying on his back, partially dressed in a dressing gown and boxer shorts.

The body was smeared with blood and had stab wounds.

He said Mr Pyke was 5ft 6ins tall, weighed about nine stone and was a healthy young man.

He detailed the major injury to Mr Pyke's abdomen that had gone in about eight to ten centimetres. Because there was so little blood around that wound, in Dr Bouch's opinion that injury was inflicted later in the alleged attack or when he was dead or dying.

There were defence injuries caused to the hands as Mr Pyke defended himself.

There was grazing to the right knee and stabbing at the top of the right thigh, the court heard.

Dr Bouch agreed that the injury to Mr Pyke's knee was possibly as he tried to protect himself in a foetal position.

Earlier in the trial photos of the scene that greeted police after were used to guide jurors through the evidence of forensic scientist John Page.

Blood dripped from Mr Pyke as he allegedly tried to get away from Heiss on the day of the Suffolk man's death, September 19, the court heard. In the living room there were finger marks in blood around drawers, and the couple's bed was heavily bloodstained.

"In my view, the blood pattern around the bed indicates the assault continued around the bed," said Mr Page, who specialises in interpreting blood pattern evidence.

Prosecutor Shaun Smith QC said: "Mr Pyke ended up by the computer area. He has got there by dragging himself along the floor."

Mr Page said: "That is an explanation for the blood-staining there."

The trial continues.