A MAN told a jury he heard a bang and seconds later realised his friend had been shot.
Matthew Howitt, 58, was giving evidence on the second day of the trial of Stuart McGinley, 32, from Drumchapel, and 33-year-old Renton man Mark Harvey.
The pair deny attempting to murder 34-year-old Darren McCafferty at Lynn Walk, Balloch, on December 20, 2018.
In evidence at the High Court in Glasgow on Thursday, Mr Howitt told prosecutor Iain McSporran QC: “I heard a bang and I thought it was a car backfiring outside."
Mr McCafferty was in the street waiting to buy a slushie from an ice cream van at the time.
The court heard Mr Howitt looked out of the window, but couldn't see anything.
Mr McCafferty, he said, then came into the house clutching his side and said: "I've been shot."
Mr Howitt, from Alexandria, pressed tea towels to the wound and an ambulance was called.
Defence counsel Sarah Livingstone asked Mr Howitt: "You didn't see Darren being shot, did you?" and he replied: "No."
READ MORE: 'I was shot as I queued at an ice cream van,' Balloch man tells High Court jury
The court also heard that in a statement given at Clydebank police station on December 23, 2018, Mr Howitt claimed that he saw Mr McGinley with a gun a week before the shooting.
In the statement he said: “I invited Stuart to my house for a cup of tea. We were both sitting on the settee.
"Stuart put his hand into his jacket pocket. He pulled a revolver out his pocket, I think he pulled it out by mistake.”
But, in court Mr Howitt denied he thought it was a gun and said: “I just thought it was a novelty thing, like a lighter.”
Mr McCafferty's brother Daniel Mullen, 28, told the court he never heard any shots.
He told the jury: “I didn't hear anything until I heard him shouting at the bottom of the stairs he had been shot.”
Mr Mullen added: “There was a bullet on the floor. My grandmother put a cup over it.”
He was asked what he had done and replied: “I was in shock, I was traumatised.”
The trial, before judge Norman McFadyen, continues.
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