A 17-year-old has told a court how he found the body of Louise Evans in a Burnley park after hearing her plead with her attack-ers to stop.

The teenager, who had been part of a group who had gone to Towneley Park in July with 18-year-old Miss Evans, had left before the attack but told Preston Crown Court that he heard screams and pleas for help as he walked away.

Giving evidence at Preston Crown Court, the 17-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, told how he and two others, Tracy Parkinson and Jason Hardacre, heard Louise’s screams from the secluded spot where she was with Anthony Wood, 21 and Matthew Maw, 19.

Maw has already admitted Miss Evans’s murder but Wood denies the same charge in planning and encouraging the brutal assault.

The witness said he had heard Miss Evans scream ‘please no’ and ‘please don’t’ before hearing a repetitive sound, “like she was being hit with a brick” and “grunting” from Maw.

On the second day of the two-week trial, the witness said that on returning to the scene he saw former Haslingden High School pupil Louise “for ten seconds” by the light of a mobile phone.

Prosecuting, Louise Blackwell QC said: “I won’t ask you to go into detail as to what you saw, but if you had to use one word to describe it, what would it be?”

He replied: “Sick”, adding: “Tracy (Parkinson) thought she was alive and was talking to her, but I thought she was dead”. Asked if she made any sound, he said: “She was gurgling”.

The court heard that earlier he had been amongst a group that had gone to the canalside to drink, where Wood had told him he was going to kill Louise and had shown him a knife. He added that Wood had argued with Miss Evans that night “only for a short time and I don’t know what about”.

The witness said: “I said he was mad, crazy and I didn’t bel-ieve him. He said she was doing his head in.” Later the group of around ten had returned to the hostel in Elizabeth Street, Burn-ley, where five of them, includ-ing Miss Evans, Maw and Wood, were refused entry for breaking the no-alcohol rule.

Miss Evans was living at the hostel after moving from her Haslingden home. She had prev-iously moved from Colne.

Planning to spend the night outside, they headed to Town-eley Park were this time Maw showed the knife to the 17-year-old. He said: “Anthony told me he had passed the knife to Matty to do it. A few minutes later Matt came over and showed me the knife in his tracksuit bottoms.”

He said that during the night Miss Evans became very upset.

He said: “She was drunk and saying something about a brain tumour.

"Matthew went mental at her. He was not loud but he was aggressive.”

(Proceeding)