Teen smothered ballet star, 10, at party, court told

A 10-YEAR-OLD stage star was smothered to death when play fighting at a Christmas party ended in tragedy, a British court heard yesterday.

Ballet dancer Rosie May Storrie was found face down on a bed as her parents chatted with guests downstairs at a house in Normanton, Leicestershire.

A jury at Nottingham Crown Court heard that 18-year-old accused Paul Smith was the last person seen with her.

Smith, of Bowmans Way, Sedgebrook, Lincolnshire, denies murdering the youngster, from Bottesford, Leicestershire, on December 30 last year.

A post mortem revealed Rosie was suffocated after she was forced down into the bedclothes so she could not breathe, the jury heard.

Paul Mann QC, prosecuting, said the 10-year-old had gone to the party on December 28 last year with her two brothers, Luke, 16, and Lawrence, 13, and their parents. At 9pm she went upstairs. It was there that her friend Joe Smith said he last spotted her being chased by his cousin, Paul Smith.

Mr Mann said: “What we suggest has happened in this case is that when Rosie got up there, she in one form or another started to take the mickey out of Paul Smith.

“There is evidence that she pinched that beer can from out of his hand and started to run along the hallway and that she was being chased by Paul Smith.”

He said her brother Lawrence went upstairs to find her and believes he saw Paul Smith’s hand on one of the bedroom door handles.

Minutes afterwards, Joe Smith went into the bedroom and found Rosie lying still, face down on the bed, the court was told. She died two days later.

Mr Mann said Smith had once carried out an attack on a girl which had all the “hallmarks” of the attack on Rosie May. He said a cousin of Smith would allege he attacked her by forcing her face down into his bed nearly two years before Rosie May was killed.

The trial continues.