Coronation Street copycat killer goes on trial

A teenage boy who it is claimed was obsessed with Corrie character John Stape has gone on trial accused of a killing similar to one which featured in the soap. The boy cannot be named for legal reasons but his trial has begun at Nottingham Crown Court and the prosecution are claiming that Stape's murder of Charlotte Hoyle bears many similarities to the death at the centre of the case.

Shaun Smith QC, prosecuting, said in his opening statement: 'He was, we say, obsessed with John Stape, the Coronation Street man who killed a woman with a hammer and made it look like she had been injured in a crash. You will hear about a young man who immersed himself in a fantasy world; fantasy words he wrote, television drama, films he accessed by the internet and other internet sites. And he did that to such an extent that the prosecution say the boundaries between real life and fiction became very, very tragically blurred.'
The case continues.