I didn't mean to kill him, sobs youth

A man accused of cutting a schoolboy's throat broke down in tears as he apologised to his victim's parents, saying he was "really sorry" the teenager died, a jury heard.

Jake Fahri, 19, sobbed as he told detectives he had not meant to kill 16-year-old Jimmy Mizen during a violent row about queuing at a bakery.

Mr Farhi turned himself in three days after throwing a glass dish with such force it shattered. A shard of glass severed at Jimmy jugular and an artery to the brain. In a scene described as similar to a horror film, Jimmy bled to death in the arms of his elder brother at the Three Cooks Bakery in Lee, South-east London, in May last year.

A recording of a police interview with Mr Fahri was played to the Old Bailey as Jimmy's parents, Barry, 57, and Margaret, 56, listened from the public gallery. The accused gave officers his version of the events that led to the death as he argued with Jimmy and his brother, Harry, 19.

He said he panicked when Jimmy, who was 6ft 2in tall and weighed 14 stone, pulled an advertising sign he was brandishing from his hands. In the recording, Mr Fahri's voice began to falter and he wept as he said: "I looked to my left. There was a tray there. I picked it up and threw it. I didn't mean to hit him, I didn't. I just threw it. I thought he would put his hands up so he'd let go of the sign.

"I didn't think it would smash. I didn't want to hurt him. I might have been lippy at the start, you know, but I didn't mean it to happen."

The prosecution alleges that Mr Fahri kicked and smashed the shop door and became increasingly angry before hurling the dish. A pathologist, Dr Benjamin Swift, told jurors Jimmy bled to death after the dish shattered on his jaw. Mr Fahri denies murder, claiming he acted in self-defence, and the trial continues.