Man, 93, died after hours of torture by paranoid cannabis user, jury told

Northampton Crown Court heard how Martin Glynn was punched, kicked, stamped on and strangled in a “senseless attack” by Samuel Field at Field’s home in Desborough, Northamptonshire, in September 2024.Jurors were shown a photograph of Mr Glynn’s battered face and told that he never walked again, dying on Boxing Day, three months after the attack.Opening the prosecution case on Monday, Adrian Langdale KC told the court how Mr Glynn was fit and healthy enough to make a journey of more than two hours, using multiple buses, to the defendant’s home on Gold Street, from his home in Northampton, on September 19.Mr Langdale said he arrived at his friend’s property at around 11.24am and this was “the last time he would be seen by the outside world in a normal form – being able to care and look after himself, to do things for himself”.Read More: Former X Factor contestant, 29, charged with attempted murder after car ploughs into influencer outside London nightclubRead More: Horror as female police officer stabbed in neck in 'truly shocking' incident - as suspect, 25, arrested The prosecutor said: “Over the course of the next 28 hours, this defendant, seemingly high on cannabis, suffering from paranoia caused by cannabis consumption, and deliberately not sleeping, would repeatedly and savagely punch, kick and stamp on the head, and then strangle until there were fractures of the neck of Mr Glynn.“On the evidence, the crown say, effectively torturing Martin Glynn.”Mr Langdale said that by 4.22pm that afternoon, Mr Glynn was “sprawled helplessly on the living-room floor”.He said the assaults continued as Field questioned Mr Glynn about an “imagined conspiracy”.The prosecutor told the jury: “When Mr Glynn did not answer to this defendant in the way that this defendant wanted, probably because at that stage he had already suffered the effects of bleeds on the brain, this defendant simply assaulted him again and again and again.”Mr Langdale said: “The brutality of the assault on a 93-year-old man was entirely pointless, entirely unjustified, but was seemingly driven by this defendant’s state he had put himself in.”The prosecutor told the jury this is known because Mr Glynn was forced into a “recorded interrogation” which has been recovered.He said it appears Field was a “ticking time-bomb in the days and hours leading up to this attack”.Mr Langdale said: “Mr Glynn, unfortunately, walked into that ticking time-bomb.”He said the defendant had become threatening and abusive to his family, to a shopkeeper, his landlord and probation officers with increasingly bizarre allegations against them.The prosecutor said: “It was into that brewing storm, and seemingly unbeknown to Mr Glynn, he visited the person he thought was his friend.”He said Field made some admissions about what he had done but these fell “a long way short of being the full story of the brutality of the assault”.Mr Langdale told the court that Mr Glynn never left a hospital or care home bed after the events of September 19 and 20, and died on December 26.He said: “Mr Glynn never recovered. And his health and ability to do anything independently – from walking to talking and, eventually, even swallowing – rapidly declined.”He added: “It will be the crown’s case that the rapid decline and eventual death were due to the assault perpetrated the 19th and 20th.”Mr Langdale said he understands that Field claims he was in a “concerned, anxious and paranoid” state in the lead-up to the incident because unknown people had been accessing his flat.But the prosecutor told jurors that this paranoia was “undoubtedly caused by him and his increasing consumption of drug, in particular cannabis”.Field, 40, formerly of Gold Street, Desborough, denies murder.He also denies charges of manslaughter, grievous bodily harm with intent and grievous bodily harm, which Mr Langdale explained were alternatives to the murder charge.The prosecutor told the jury: “You may think that, if you repeatedly punch a nine-stone, 93-year-old man, let alone kick him, or stamp to his head area, or strangle him to such an extent that you fracture bones to his neck, you could seriously be intending to cause anything other than really serious harm.”The prosecution opening is due to continue on Tuesday morning.

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