Fatally stabbed teenager Jamil Palmer “seemed really angry” as he fought with another boy a few hours before his death, a witness told the Old Bailey.

Lindsay Hayman saw a fight between Mr Palmer, 18, and one of the defendants, who was 16 at the time, at about 1.15pm on May 6 at Browells Lane in Feltham.

She told the court Mr Palmer, of Belgrade Road in Hampton, had appeared angry and aggressive.

Miss Hayman said: “I noticed the tall, black male, who I now know to be Jamil, shouting.

“All I could hear was ‘one-on-one’ – he seemed really angry, I could see it in his face.”

Mr Palmer was stood over the defendant, now 17, who cannot be named for legal reasons, who was on the floor, the court heard.

A group of five, four men and one girl, had crossed the road in front of Miss Hayman’s car and she told the court the girl had crouched down next to the boy on the floor to support his head.

She said: “I thought he was really, really hurt.

“For someone to be on the floor that quick, I thought it must have been something for him to hit the floor so quick.”

The court also heard how, on February 26, Mr Palmer and the same defendant had clashed outside the Hounslow Youth Offending Team (YOT) offices in Isleworth.

Dominic Daley, an employee who works at the YOT, said: “Jamil Palmer struck [the defendant] a couple of times with his belt, mainly in the face and neck.”

Another employee, Kieran Joiner, a YOT operations manager, said: “On one occasion when I was shepherding Jamil away he used a phrase talking about there being a war.”

Mr Palmer and the defendant both appeared at Feltham Youth Court over the fight on May 6, the day of the alleged Browells Lane fight and Mr Palmer’s later death in Crane Park.

Kishon Zelaya, 18, from Reading, and four other defendants, aged 15, 16, 16 and 17 years old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, all deny murder.

The trial continues before the jury on Monday.