Man found guilty of killing friend in knife attack

A 25-year-old man has been found guilty of stabbing a friend to death outside the victim's flat.

Lewis Mullen attacked Jack Trainner, 27, after a fight broke out when he turned up at his home in Port Glasgow, Inverclyde.

Mullen claimed his friend had pulled a knife on him but was charged with murder.

After a trial at the High Court in Glasgow, Mullen was convicted of the reduced charge of culpable homicide while acting under provocation. He will be sentenced in February.

The court had heard how the men would sometimes meet up to play video games together.

Mullen said he turned up at Trainner's flat on the day of the killing in April 2024 thinking "it would be like any other time and he would invite me in".

But he added: "When I knocked, I could see that he was aggressive right away."

A struggle then spilled outside before Mullen followed Trainner back into the common close of the block of flats.

The killer said his victim went at him with a knife before Mullen struck him with a purple-bladed weapon that he had in rucksack.

Mullen said he believed he had only struck his friend once in the chest, but it emerged he also had a cut near his eye.

Asked by his KC Thomas Ross how long he had to "assess his options" that day, he replied: "Seconds - it all happened so quickly."

He said he believed that, had he turned his back, he would have been stabbed.

Mullen left the scene, but later handed himself in to police after he discovered Trainner had died.

During the trial, prosecutor Wojciech Jajdelski asked Mullen why he had not simply "walked away" after they had gone outside.

He replied: "We were friends. This was not the Jack I knew. I thought I could calm him down."

After the verdict, the court was told Mullen had a number of previous convictions, but had never received a prison sentence.

Judge Lord Renucci ordered he continue to be remanded in custody ahead of sentencing on 12 February in Dundee.