A TEENAGE drug addict was hunted down, stabbed through the heart and stamped on as he lay dying in the street, a court heard yesterday.

Two men and a 17-year-old youth are standing trial at Teesside Crown Court, accused of the murder last June of Wayne Bircham, 19, in Grangetown, Teesside.

Derek Angus, 29, of Carnaevon Road, Eston, and Darren Hart, 20, of Upper Oxford Street, South Bank, and the youth, also from South Bank, who cannot be named for legal reasons and is alleged to have stabbed Mr Bircham, all deny the charge.

The men also deny a charge of affray relating to the same incident.

Mr Bircham was a heroin addict who even stole from his friends to pay for his drugs.

William Lowe QC, prosecuting, said the teenager was suspected of stealing money and drugs from an address in Granville Road, Grangetown, which was known as a "smack house" because heroin was sold there.

The house was fortified to keep out the police and rival gangs, and customers queued in the back yard to buy drugs at a window, the jury was told.

Mr Bircham ran up drug debts at the house, and his grandmother gave him £150 and took him there to pay them off.

Four days before the killing, he was stabbed in the arm at the house, the court heard. On Sunday, June 10, he was again at the house, trying to get heroin, when he was chased off.

As he fled through the streets, witnesses saw one man stab him through the heart, in Lanchester Street. As he lay dying, another man stamped on his head, shouting that he was a "dirty smackhead".

Mr Angus yesterday pleaded guilty to wounding Mr Bircham with intent to cause grievous bodily harm in the earlier incident.