A teenage girl was shot in the head after a falling-out between members of a female dance group known as the X Squad, the Old Bailey was told yesterday.

Annaka Pinto, 17, who had just completed her GCSE exams, was shot on the dancefloor of a nightclub in North London. She died hours later in hospital.

The man accused of killing her, Triston Walker, 22, was allegedly seen posturing with a gun in his waistband minutes before the shooting.

David Jeremy, QC, said that the murder was the result of a dispute between the X Squad girls and Lasticia Manning, a former member of the group. Ms Manning's sister, Simone, was Mr Walker's girlfriend and ill-feeling between the rival groups built up in the days before the shooting.

Mr Jeremy said: “It appears it was this fallout between the X Squad girls that led to the shooting of Annaka Pinto.”

At a confrontation in Bruce Grove, Tottenham, that week, Mr Walker was seen with a gun, it is claimed. Then, in the early hours of June 23 last year, he went to The Swan pub in Tottenham, where the dance group were performing. Mr Jeremy said: “The CCTV shows he was searched, but it really amounts to a pat down the sides of his body. The prosecution doesn't know whether he smuggled his gun into the venue or whether he got someone else to smuggle it in for him.”

CCTV recordings from the club showed Mr Walker and his friends, including two men known by the street names Creeper and TJ, watching the XSquad girls performing near the DJ tables.

Mr Jeremy said: “At about 5am, as the club closed and while Annaka was still on the dancefloor, she was shot in the head causing an injury from which she died later on that day. Triston Walker fired that shot. He used a handgun that has never been recovered and he is charged with the murder.”

In the hours before the shooting the XSquad girls, including Annaka, were on one side of the club while Mr Walker and his group - including Ms Manning - were on the other. While dancing, the XSquad girls saw Mr Walker, who allegedly flicked open his jacket to show the handgun in his waistband.

Mr Jeremy said: “The dance came to an end and the lights came on about five o'clock in the morning. People started to leave. Some sort of fight broke out between members of Walker's group and the X Squad girls.”

The court was told that, seconds before the shooting, security cameras caught Mr Walker with a gun in his hand and two people trying to grapple with him. Mr Jeremy said: “He broke free and headed for the exit. Shortly after that, as he retreated through the doorway, he fired the shot that killed Annaka Pinto.”

A camera recorded Mr Walker looking “wide-eyed” into the lens, Mr Jeremy said.

Mr Walker, who denies murder, claims that the gun was not his, that he did not fire the shot and that he got hold of it after a struggle with another man.

The court was told that after the shooting Mr Walker fled and was arrested in the Cowley area of Oxford a month later.

Annaka was shot just above the ear and suffered fatal brain damage. She died later in the Royal London Hospital, East London. Fragments of 0.32-calibre bullet were found in her head in a post-mortem examination.

Three other defendants, including Mr Walker's girlfriend, Simone Manning, 19, are accused of assisting an offender.

The trial continues.

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