A trio of murder accused were seen together at the Angus children’s playpark where they are alleged to have attacked oil worker Steven Donaldson.
The trip were spotted by agriculture student Jack Elder just hours before 27-year-old Mr Donaldson’s dead body was found at a local nature reserve.
Mr Elder told the High Court he saw Tasmin Glass and Callum Davidson together in her car, with Steven Dickie alongside on his motorbike, at Kirriemuir’s Peter Pan playpark just after 10pm on Wednesday, June 6.
Mr Donaldson’s body and burned out BMW were found around seven hours later by RSPB staff arriving for work at Kinnordy Loch outside the Angus town.
In evidence, 18-year-old Mr Elder said he had gone to the playpark car park with four friends after a swim at the Reekie Linn waterfall and recognised Glass’s distinctive orange car when they pulled in.
He told advocate depute Ashley Edwards: “Tasmin’s car was in the car park. I knew of her, I wouldn’t say I was a friend.
“It was quite distinctive. Tasmin was driving, Callum Davidson was in the passenger seat and Claire Ogston was in the back of the car.”
He said Dickie was on his motorbike at the other side of Glass’s car, in his biking leathers.
Mr Elder said: “All the windows were down in Tasmin’s car and they were speaking to Steven. I thought it would be polite and I put my windows down and we had a general conversation as well.”
He was asked if there had been a discussion about their plans that night and he said he believed Dickie was going to drop his motorbike off at Davidson’s house.
Mr Elder then told the court he spoke to Dickie about his motorbike and they agreed to go out on the road.
“Tasmin left first, we were just going to go and have a race,” said the witness.
He followed Dickie out the Brechin road to a crossroads east of the town before turning round and heading back into Kirriemuir.
After Dickie turned off, Mr Elder went to Sunnyside in Kirriemuir to drop off a friend and he saw Glass’s car parked there.
He said he was certain there was only one person in the vehicle but could not see who it was.
In response to the advocate depute, Mr Elder said he had been out of Kirriemuir for around ten minutes after leaving the Peter Pan park.
