Victim's ex-wife 'hoped he would get acid in face'

The ex-wife of a drug dealer killed by an acid attack told him "I hope you and your butters girl both end up with acid in your faces", a murder trial has heard.

Danny Cahalane, 38, was attacked at his home on Lipson Road, Plymouth, on 21 February 2025 and died in hospital on 3 May. Nine people are on trial at Winchester Crown Court.

Prosecutor Jo Martin KC previously told the jury Cahalane told police that drugs boss Ryan Kennedy was the man behind the attack, to whom he was in "significant debt".

Paris Wilson, 35, from Plymouth, denies prior knowledge of the attack and said, if she had known, their daughter "would not have been" in the house at the time.

"He's her dad, she needs him," Wilson told the court.

Wilson told jurors she did not know where Cahalane lived when the incident happened.

She said if she had known about the acid attack prior to it taking place, she would have informed Cahalane.

"I would have said to him 'this is what I've heard is going to happen to you'," Wilson told the court.

Addressing prosecutor Jo Martin KC, Wilson said: "I absolutely did not, I can tell you Ms Martin, hate him [Danny] that much."

Wilson said she was "under the impression that things had been sorted" between Cahalane and Kennedy, who is known as "Frost".

But the court heard she later learnt a drug debt had not been settled.

"To hear that Dan had robbed him, that upset me," Wilson told jurors.

Referring to the acid-related message she sent to Cahalane on 17 February 2025, Wilson told the court: "It's just horrible that I said that and that's what happened."

Wilson said the message was not "quite simply a coincidence", adding she had heard of acid being used as a threat before.

A transcript of Wilson's police interview was shown to jurors.

When asked by police what led to her sending the acid-related message to Cahalane just days before the attack, she said it was out of "spite, nastiness".

"I think Frost had mentioned to me before, oh sorry, amongst a manner of things about sort of cutting his fingers off, melting him, um setting fire to him, things like that," Wilson told police.

She told the court she never paid "any attention" to the threats.

Wilson and Jude Hill, 43, from Plymouth, Abdulrasheed Adedoja, 23, Israel Augustus, 26, Isanah Sungum, 22, Ramarnee Bakas, 23 and Brian Kalemba, 23, all from London, are charged with murder and an alternative charge of manslaughter.

Wilson, Adedoja, Bakas, Augustus, Sungum and Kalemba have also been charged with being part of an organised crime gang, along with and Arrone Mukuna, 25, and Jean Mukuna, 23 from London.

Adedoja, Bakas, Wilson, Jean Mukuna and Arrone Mukuna are also charged with attempted kidnapping.

The trial continues.

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