An asylum seeker accused of murdering a hotel worker has told a jury he was not at the train station where she was fatally stabbed and had no reason to want to harm her or kill her. Deng Chol Majek told his trial he was “staying in the hotel, outside” at the time Rhiannon Whyte was attacked, and had never spoken to her during the three months he lived at Walsall’s Park Inn hotel.
Prosecutors allege Majek, who claims to be 19, was caught on CCTV following Ms Whyte from the hotel to the nearby Bescot Stadium station, where she was stabbed in the head 19 times with a screwdriver on October 20 last year.
Majek, who denies murder and possessing a screwdriver as an offensive weapon, had his replies translated by a Sudanese Arabic interpreter as he gave evidence to Wolverhampton Crown Court on Tuesday.
Answering questions from defence KC Gurdeep Garcha, Majek said he had “never had a problem with anyone” at the hotel and had never noticed Ms Whyte while staying there.
As well as giving details of his upbringing in Sudan, Majek confirmed that he had spent time in Libya, Italy and Germany before coming to the UK to claim asylum in July last year.
Mr Garcha asked Majek: “This case concerns the assault on Rhiannon Whyte on October 20, 2024. In that assault, she received injuries from which she died a few days later. Were you at Bescot train station at the time she was stabbed?”
Majek answered: “No.”
The defendant again answered simply “no” when he was asked if he was “responsible for that fatal assault” on the platform.
Asked where he was at the time of the attack, Majek responded: “I was staying in the hotel, outside.”
After telling the court that he was aged 19 and had left Sudan when he was 16, Majek stated that an incorrect date of birth held by authorities in Germany, which would mean he is actually 27, was due to a mistake on an identity document.
Mr Garcha questioned Majek as to how he had got on with the staff during his “three months or so” at the hotel.
“I never had a problem with anyone,” he said, adding that he had not witnessed any other residents having problems with members of staff.
Answering questions specifically relating to Ms Whyte, Majek claimed he had never had an argument with the 27-year-old and that there were no issues between them.
He then answered “no” to questions asking if he had any reason to want to harm Ms Whyte, or any reason to cause her really serious injury, or to kill her.
After telling the jurors he did not own a screwdriver while living at the hotel, Majek was invited to identify who was responsible for fixing things if anything came loose in his hotel room.
Majek said: “I was told by the staff at the hotel that if anything is broken, not to fix it and to report it to the staff.”
The trial has heard claims that Majek spent prolonged periods staring “spookily” at Ms Whyte and two of her female colleagues and that he brushed into her deliberately in the hotel entrance shortly before the end of her shift.
Majek told the court there was no specific reason he was eating alone and listening to music while near the workers in the hotel’s bar area.
Denying that he was looking at Ms Whyte or trying to make the staff members feel uncomfortable, Majek said: “I had no problems with anyone. I was just listening to music.
“I didn’t have them in mind, and I was thinking about something else.”
After jurors were shown CCTV footage recorded at the hotel’s main entrance around an hour before Mr Whyte was attacked, Mr Garcha asked: “As you walked through the door, did you deliberately brush past the women as they came in the other way?”
Majek stated: “No I didn’t. I was just walking my own path. I didn’t hit anyone.”
The trial continues.
