Doubt cast on Harrogate murder suspect’s claim

Doubt has been cast on a murder suspect’s claim that he was not involved in the death of Gracijus Balciauskas at a flat on Mayfield Grove in Harrogate last year.

Jaroslaw Rutowicz, 39, and Vitalijus Koreiva, 36, are accused of murdering Mr Balciauskas at a flat on Mayfield Grove in Harrogate on December 20 last year.

The trial at Leeds Crown Court began two weeks ago with the prosecution giving evidence.  The court heard how Mr Balciauskas’s body was found wrapped in a rug.

Mr Rutowicz took the stand last week to begin his defence. He claimed Mr Koreiva violently killed Gracijus Balciauskas after a drunken game of chess turned ugly — and then threatened to do the same to him if he dialled 999 for help.

Today Mr Rutowicz was cross-examined by Mr Koreiva’s barrister, Peter Moulson QC, who suggested his version of events was “simply a lie”.

‘In shock’

Much of Mr Moulson’s questioning focused on why Mr Rutowicz did not call the police until almost 18 hours after the alleged murder took place.

The court had previously been shown CCTV footage of Mr Rutowicz leaving the flat and returning several times to buy alcohol in the hours after Mr Balciauskas died.

Mr Moulson QC said:

“For almost 18 hours after your friend sustained his injuries, you went backwards and forwards to the flat voluntarily. You were never being threatened by Mr Koreiva, that is simply a lie.”

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During today’s hearing, Mr Rutowicz repeatedly said that he was in shock after witnessing the death of Mr Balciauskas.

Mr Rutowicz repeated his previous claim that he had been threatened by Mr Koreiva with his life if he called the police. He said Mr Koreiva’s nickname in Harrogate was the “crazy Russian” and he had an unpredictable character.

He said:

“It was that fear. Nobody had threatened me before in my life like that, that he would find me and kill me. As long as that aggression was there I kept coming back.”

Harrowing images

The court was again shown harrowing video images, filmed on Mr Rutowicz’s phone, of Mr Balciauskas bloodied and barely conscious after being assaulted at the flat on Mayfield Grove.

Mr Moulson QC suggested the reason he filmed the encounter was to use it as a threat against Mr Balciauskas if he “crossed” the pair again, which Mr Rutowicz denied.

He said:

“[I filmed it] so I could report to police what Vitalijus had done. I didn’t kill him. I didn’t beat him.”

The afternoon finished with Mr Koreiva on the stand beginning his evidence. The trial continues tomorrow.

Harrogate murder trial adjourned until next week

The murder trial of Vitalijus Koreiva and Jaroslaw Rutowicz has been adjourned until Monday due to problems finding a Lithuanian translator.

Mr Koreiva, 36, and Mr Rutowicz, 39, are accused of murdering Gracijus Balciauskas at a flat on Mayfield Grove in Harrogate on December 20 last year.

The trial began on Monday last week at Leeds Crown Court and was set to continue until at least the end of this week.

Mr Koreiva, who is Lithuanian, was due to take the stand this week but his translator is unavailable until Friday and the court has been unable to find another one.

One of the 12 jurors has also caught covid, so Judge Rodney Jameson QC today adjourned the trial until Monday morning.

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The trial began last week with the prosecution giving evidence.

The court heard how Mr Balciauskas’ body was found wrapped in a rug and CCTV footage was shown of the three men buying alcohol in the hours leading up to his death.

This week, the defence began with Mr Rutowicz claiming Mr Koreiva violently killed Mr Balciauskas after a drunken game of chess turned ugly — and then threatened to do the same to him if he dialled 999 for help.

Harrogate murder trial hears that body was found in a rug

A court heard today how a suspected murder victim in Harrogate was found wrapped up in a rug in a flat on Mayfield Grove after one of his alleged killers told somebody nearby, “I killed a man”.

Vitalijus Koreiva, 36, and Jaroslaw Rutowicz, 38, are accused of murdering Gracijus Balciauskas on December 20 last year.

The trial at Leeds Crown Court, which began today and is due to last for 10 days, tracked the movements of the three men on CCTV.

The court heard a witness statement from an employee at Asda on Bower Road, who found an agitated Mr Rutowicz sitting on a wall by the supermarket on the evening when Mr Balciauskas died.

The employee said Mr Rutowicz appeared to have been drinking and told her “I think I’ve killed a man.”

The court was also played a recording of a 999 call from Mr Rutowicz that took place when he was outside Asda that evening. He told a call handler: “The guy, he’s dead. No, it was an accident. We drink something.”

Two police officers then met Mr Rutowicz at Asda who then walked with him to Mayfield Grove.

Inside, they found Mr Balciauskas wrapped in a rug dead. Mr Rutowicz, of no fixed address, and Mr Koreiva, of Mayfield Grove, were then arrested on suspicion of murder.

Timeline of events

Detective Constable Christopher Williams, from North Yorkshire Police, was cross-examined by prosecuting solicitor Katherine Robinson who went through a timeline of events that led to the arrest.

CCTV captured the last time Mr Balciauskas was seen alive when he went to the Polish shop next door to the flat at 1pm on December 19.

Mr Rutowicz was seen later that evening collecting a pizza takeaway and returning to the property.

In the early hours of the following morning, Mr Koreiva was seen on CCTV pacing around the property before going back inside. At around 3am the pair were seen buying bottles of alcohol and returning.

The next day, Mr Koreiva was filmed visiting the Polish shop next door in his dressing gown and Mr Rutowicz was seen buying more alcohol using the bank card of the suspected victim.

Videos on phone

This morning the court were shown films retrieved from Mr Rutowicz’s phone, timestamped at 5am and 7am on December 20.

They showed Mr Balciauskas still alive but beaten with bruises all over his hands and face whilst inside the Mayfield Grove flat.

The videos showed the two men attempting to give Mr Balciauskas cigarettes and something to drink.

Police later retrieved a photo of the victim taken at 12.04pm that day where he was apparently dead and wrapped in a rug.

More alcohol

An hour before the videos of Mr Balciauskas beaten but still alive were filmed, Mr Rutowicz and Mr Koreiva were seen on CCTV ordering a taxi to Pannal’s BP petrol station to buy more alcohol before returning to the property.

Mr Rutowicz was seen leaving Mayfield Grove at around 10am the next day to buy more alcohol. He was again seen using Mr Balciauskas’s bank card to buy more alcohol at 2pm.

At around 11pm, Mr Rutowicz was captured on CCTV leaving the flat to go to Asda on Bower Street when the 999 call took place.

Arresting officer PC Joseph Horne gave a statement to the court that said Mr Rutowicz was crying and talking on the way to the police station.

PC Horne said:

“I couldn’t understand what he was saying because of his thick accent. When in custody he said ‘It was an accident, my brother is dead I will show you how he did it’.”

The trial continues tomorrow.

Harrogate man gives garden a Ukraine-themed makeover

Harrogate man Paul Ivison has given his landmark garden a Ukraine-themed makeover to raise money for the Disaster Emergency Fund.

Mr Ivison has lived in his house on the corner of Mayfield Grove and Mayfield Terrace for over 15 years and likes to decorate his garden with different themes.

When the Stray Ferret visited last summer, he had created a loud and proud mental health-themed garden to raise money for Mind.

For winter, he created a ‘Toytropolis’ with toys to make children and their parents smile.

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This time he wants to support the humanitarian effort in Ukraine and also pay tribute to Poland for housing two million refugees.

During the 1990s, Mr Ivison was the manager of LGBT magazine, Now UK, and he is also displaying photos he took of celebrities including Graham Norton, Lily Savage and Ian McKellen.

The garden is open to visitors seven days a week and all of the toys are for sale. It’s been sponsored by the sweets supplier Maltese Connections. Some pictures are below:

To donate to his fundraiser visit here.

 

Man denies murder at flat on Harrogate’s Mayfield Grove

A man has denied murder following the death of a 41-year-old man in Harrogate.

Vitalijus Koreiva, 36, is accused of murdering Gracijus Balciauskas on December 20 last year. Mr Balciauskas’s body was found at a flat in Mayfield Grove at about 11.30pm.  

Koreiva, of Mayfield Grove, appeared at Leeds Crown Court via video link today when he pleaded not guilty to the allegation. 

A second murder suspect, 38-year-old Jaroslaw Rutowicz, of no fixed address, has yet to enter a plea to the charge. 

Judge Geoffrey Marson QC adjourned the case for a trial on June 20. It is expected to last 10 days. Koreiva and Rutowicz were remanded in custody.

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Jail for drug dealers who boasted of Harrogate street earnings

Two drug dealers who bragged they were making so much money they would soon need a “counting machine” have been jailed for a combined four years.

Notorious thug Sirus Alexander, 21, and Robert Varela, 26, immersed themselves in the “dark world” of the Harrogate narcotics trade in which money and hard drugs were so easy to come by that they treated four-figure profits as “minor” financial gains, York Crown Court heard.

They were finally caught thanks to eagle-eyed security staff and Harrogate Borough Council’s CCTV operators who spotted them engaging in a shady transaction in a red Audi with two “unknown men” behind an Early Learning Centre in the town centre, said prosecutor Michael Cahill.

Alexander and Varela scuttled off to a nearby Travelodge where they stashed over 60 wraps of heroin and cocaine in their room.

Police turned up at the hotel just after midnight, but Alexander and Varela had vanished.

A search of the room revealed a major cocaine and heroin stash worth about £2,575 — as well as a machete and digital weighing scales.

At about 4am the following morning, police received another call from CCTV operators who spotted the pair going into Asda in the town centre.

Officers swooped on the supermarket and arrested the two men. Varela was found with a large hunting knife in his jacket and about £300 cash. Alexander threw his mobile phone underneath a car just before his arrest.

Varela, formerly of Harrogate but lately of Bradford, and Alexander, from Elland, each admitted two counts of supplying a Class A drug with intent to supply. Varela also admitted carrying a blade.

£1,200 for cocaine a ‘minor’ amount

They appeared for sentence on Tuesday but only Varela was in the dock. Alexander appeared via video link from Hull Prison where he is currently serving a 10-year jail sentence for robbery and wounding following a stabbing incident in Harrogate just two months after he was arrested for the drug offences.

Mr Cahill said that security guards at the Early Learning Centre spotted the pair and the two unidentified men on the afternoon of April 23, 2019 in what was patently a drug transaction.

Alexander’s phone showed he had been dealing since 2017. It appeared that Varela had only been dealing in the days before his arrest.

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In one of the messages on their phones, they bragged that £1,200 – the “going rate” for an ounce of cocaine” – was a “minor” amount and that “we can smash this thing and that 46 (drug wraps) went in one hour”.

In another exchange, they boasted that they were “making so much money we are (going to) need a counting machine”.

Laced drink with bleach

Both men had previous convictions but it was Alexander whose criminal record was the most “worrying”.

He had previous convictions for violence, possessing a knife, racially aggravated harassment and vehicle theft, and one for administering poison in 2016, when he laced someone’s drink with bleach.

By far the most serious of his 26 previous offences was the incident in June 2019 when he robbed three men at knifepoint in Harrogate town centre while wearing a skull mask.

Alexander stabbed two of the victims in the thigh with a carving knife after ambushing them in Harrogate town centre. He told the “terrified” men they were “going to die” and ordered them to empty their pockets.

Alexander, who was a heavy cocaine user and fan of violent video games, was jailed for 10 years and nine months in February 2020 after he admitted two counts of robbery and two of wounding with intent.

The victims had been making their way home from a night out when Alexander pounced near the Asda store on the corner of Mayfield Grove and Strawberry Dale.

He took some cash, tobacco and a rucksack containing items including a mobile phone after slashing out with the large kitchen knife. The victims suffered “gaping” wounds and deep psychological harm.

Branded with hot knife

Harry Crowson, for Alexander, said his client still had another three years to serve of the 10-year jail sentence for the robberies.

He said that Alexander, who had spent his entire childhood in care, had been exploited by county lines drug bosses following a traumatic upbringing.

Christopher Haddock, for Varela, said his client had started dealing to feed his “expensive” drug habit and pay off debts to his suppliers.

He said that in October last year, Varela was hospitalised after his drug overlords “branded” him with a hot knife. Varela refused to disclose the identity of these men.

Judge Simon Hickey told the defendants:

“You know dealing in Class A drugs on our streets brings misery, degradation and death. You were both effectively street dealers in the middle of Harrogate.”

Alexander, of The Grove, Idle, was jailed for two years. He will serve half of that sentence behind bars, consecutive to the jail term he is already serving.

Varela, of Huddersfield Road, Elland, was jailed for two years and three months.

 

 

 

Inquest opens into death of Harrogate suspected murder victim

A suspected Harrogate murder victim died from head and torso injuries, according to the coroner who opened an inquest into his death today.

Gracijus Balciauskas, 41, died just before Christmas on the night of Monday, December 20 at a flat on Mayfield Grove.

Jon Heath, senior coroner for York and North Yorkshire, said at the hearing in Northallerton today:

“Mr Balciauskas resided in Harrogate on Mayfield Grove. He was found deceased at the property the following morning.

“The provisional cause of death is by head and torso injuries. This inquest was formally opened on January 6 and adjourned pending further investigation by the police.”

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Vitalijus Koreiva, 36, of Mayfield Grove, and Jaroslaw Rutowicz, 38, of no fixed abode, appeared at York Magistrates Court last month charged with murder.

They did not enter pleas and the case was adjourned until February 4.

Suspected Harrogate murder victim named ahead of inquest

A suspected Harrogate murder victim has been named ahead of the opening of an inquest into his death tomorrow.

George Balciauskas, 41, died just before Christmas on the night of Monday, December 20 at a flat on Mayfield Grove.

A coroner will open an inquest into the circumstances surrounding Mr Balciauskas’ death tomorrow in Northallerton. The case is likely to be adjourned pending the outcome of the murder trial.

Vitalijus Koreiva, 36, of Mayfield Grove, and Jaroslaw Rutowicz, 38, of no fixed abode, appeared at York Magistrates Court last month charged with murder.

They did not enter pleas and the case was adjourned until February 4.

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No. 7: The bedsit murder at Harrogate’s ‘house from hell’

On a Friday night in March, Daniel Ainsley went to Asda in Harrogate, bought a set of kitchen knives, then dumped all but one in a bin outside the store.

He walked to 38 Mayfield Grove, where his friend Mark Wolsey had been letting him stay in his bedsit, and stabbed him 15 times.

Eight months later Ainsley, 24, was sentenced to 22 years in prison for murder.

The incident sparked revulsion for Ainsley and sympathy for Mr Wolsey, 48 — but it also triggered anger in a neighbourhood with long-standing crime concerns.

Daniel Ainsley (left) and Mark Wolsey

38 Mayfield Grove had been dubbed the house from hell as far back as 2005 when a court granted a three-month closure order after a crossbow was held at a resident’s head.

A Stray Ferret investigation this year revealed that between April 2008 and July 2021, North Yorkshire Police received 255 reports about 38 Mayfield Grove from the public.

People wanted to know why the police and Harrogate Borough Council had not done more to tackle activities at the house.

Homeless payments

They were particularly incensed that the council had transferred £2,112 in 2017 and £5,424 in 2018 to John Willis Properties Ltd, the company that owns the house.

The council said the payments were “to help customers assessed as homeless or threatened with homelessness to access private rented accommodation”. There is no suggestion of illegal activity by either party.

Locals said it beggared belief that the council had paid for homeless people to stay in a house that had been divided into six bedsits and where many tenants had multiple issues, such as drug and alcohol addictions and mental health problems, as well as backgrounds of homelessness and crime.

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They said it was difficult to think of a more dangerous scenario than housing people with multiple needs together in a terraced home on a busy street, and this problem should have been identified and tackled.

Daniel Neill, who until recently lived on Nydd Vale Terrace, a street parallel to Mayfield Grove, said:

“The entire set-up is a recipe for trouble. It doesn’t take a genius to work it out. The worst thing you can do with addicts is put them alongside other addicts.”

38 Mayfield Grove closure notice

The closure notice at 38 Mayfield Grove

Three houses closed

After the murder, the police and the council applied for a court order to close 38 Mayfield Grove, which meant tenants had to find alternative accommodation.

On June 28, magistrates granted partial closure orders against two other properties let as bedsits by John Willis, at 19 and 31 Avenue Grove, Starbeck, due to crime concerns.

Mr Willis later told the Stray Ferret he let 10 properties in Harrogate and was passionate about helping disadvantaged people, unlike many other housing providers, and did everything he reasonably could to protect them. He said:

“Other landlords cherry pick the best tenants and sadly that leaves a disadvantaged group. Homeless hostels are full. I try to help them.”

He said he’d taken many tenants from the council and partner agencies, such as Harrogate Homeless Project on Bower Street, close to Mayfield Grove, during his 31 years as a landlord.

Besides the closure orders, the police and council organised a residents’ summit and a community engagement drop-in session to discuss 38 Mayfield Grove and to reassure people that ‘the Harrogate district remains a safe place to live and any anti-social behaviour is taken very seriously’.

Mayfield Grove community engagement drop-in session June 2021

Police and council staff at the community engagement drop-in session.

But residents said the flurry of activity since the murder contrasted sharply with years of inertia that allowed crime to scar the neighbourhood and blight residents’ lives and called for action to prevent a repeat.

The police and council issued a joint statement after Ainslie’s conviction saying they had responded to and dealt with issues at Mayfield Grove “quickly and effectively”, and adding that criminals “will be held to account for their actions”.

Residents, however, continue to be concerned, particularly after a flurry of police activity on the street near the end of the year.

Two men charged with murder at Mayfield Grove flat

Two men have been charged with murder after a man was found dead at a flat in Mayfield Grove, Harrogate.

Police arrested the men, 36 and 38, on Monday night after receiving a report at around 11.30pm that a man had died there.

The two men are due to appear at York Magistrates Court.

A third man arrested in connection with the incident has been released with no further action.

DCI Jonathan Sygrove, of North Yorkshire Police’s major investigation team, said:

“I’d like to thank local residents for their patience and support while we carry out enquiries. I can reassure people that this was an isolated incident, and officers will remain in the area to provide ongoing reassurance and support to the community.”

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