Drug dealer stabbed boss to death

Mr Chenia's body was found in a burning car in Nottingham

A drug dealer's "right-hand man" stabbed his boss to death before setting fire to the car he was in to conceal evidence, a court has heard.

Shokat Chenia, 45, was found stabbed to death in his Mercedes in Wollaton, Nottingham, on 4 October 2007.

Carl Richard Fowler, 36, from Leicester, is charged with Mr Chenia's murder and appeared at Nottingham Crown Court on Monday.

The court heard Mr Fowler, who denies the charges, was unhappy over wages.

'Lost drugs'

Mr Chenia, who had eight children and lived in Leicester, was involved in the distribution and supply of class A drugs and in 2005 was jailed for drugs offences, the court heard.

He was released in the summer of 2007.

On the first day of the trial, prosecutor Gregory Dickinson QC said Mr Fowler had stabbed Mr Chenia in the neck, stomach, heart and liver before wedging the convicted drug dealer's body between the front seats of his Mercedes and torching it.

The court was told that Mr Fowler sold drugs while Mr Chenia was in prison, but in September 2007 some of his drugs - worth up to £28,000 - were lost by Mr Fowler and he received a beating as a punishment.

Shortly afterwards Mr Chenia was killed.

Gregory Dickinson QC, prosecuting, told the court: "Carl Fowler was himself a drug addict and he was involved in selling drugs, not to make a fortune, but to fund his own addiction to Class A drugs."

Mr Dickinson added: "Fowler made it clear to others that in fact he was working for nothing and he wanted more. Chenia, for his part, seemed to lose faith in Fowler.

"He told other people he was taking too many drugs and that he wanted to phase him out of the operation."

A second man, Matthew James Barker, 35, of no fixed address, has admitted a charge of assisting an offender.

The case continues.