POLICE investigating the murder of Christopher Meli are hunting for a man alleged to have stabbed another teenager twice during a fight involving up to 20 people.
It emerged during a 20-minute court hearing yesterday that a man who is alleged to have pulled a knife on Aaron Stilges (18) has not yet been located by police who have issued a warrant for his arrest.
Mr Stilges from the Turf Lodge area of Belfast was last night released on bail after being questioned about the attack in the Twinbrook area of west Belfast in the early hours of Saturday. He is said to have been treated for two stab wounds he received during the altercation.
Mr Meli (20), a father of one, was beaten to death on a Twinbrook pathway at the weekend.
Stephen McCann and Lee Smyth, both 18, and a 16-year-old male – who cannot be named because of his age – appeared before a district judge in Lisburn Magistrates Court.
Mr McCann, from Bearnagh Glen in west Belfast, and Mr Smyth, from Colinbrook Gardens in Dunmurry, sat with their heads bowed in the dock throughout the hearing. The charged youth sat at the front of the court outside the dock.
Lawyer John Finucane representing Mr McCann said his client had handed himself into police at Grosvenor Road station on Saturday and admitted punching Mr Meli but claimed he was trying to break up a fight after a knife was produced.
During a bail application for his client Mr Finucane said he understood police still wanted to speak to a number of people some of whom had “absconded” adding that an eyewitness had told police that the man being sought “was known to carry knives”.
The victim’s mother Vanessa Burke sobbed throughout the hearing, at one point crying out: “I’m never going to see my boy again.”
A 17-year-old male was also released on bail last night. Two females have been arrested in connection with the murder.
It also emerged that police are seeking a female suspect who is alleged by eyewitnesses to have said after the attack “he’s dead, you may as well empty his pockets”.
