William Lyle

William Lyle was stabbed in Westmuir Street, Glasgow.

He had been stabbed five times and had suffered a fractured skull and had a collapsed lung. He was attacked in Westmuir Street near the housing office.

A man was tried for his murder but acquitted.

He had been hunted down in the street by a gang and had had previously been the target of graffiti that foretold his death that was written on a wall outside his mother's house that read:

The graffiti had been written on the wall the day before he was murdered. There was also similar graffiti all over Glasgow.

It was said that he was being targeted because he had tried to stop drug dealers selling drugs to children.

The court heard that the man tried had said to William Lyle's mother:

A former nurse said that she saw William Lyle hit on the head with a bottle as he was kicked and stabbed in the street.  She said that after the attack one of the attackers raised his fist in a victory salute. She said that she then knew that William Lyle was dead.

After he collapsed, he lay on the road as traffic passed around him.

It was heard at the trial that William Lyle had suffered previous attempts to kill him, including three attempts at his life in 1994. Three weeks earlier he had been attacked with a machete as he got out of a taxi, and also slashed in a busy pub.

He had earlier been tried in 1991 for a bank robbery in Rutherglen in which £150,000 was stolen and a gun had been put to a baby's head but had been cleared on a technicality after it was found that it was taking too long to bring him to trial. The money was never recovered and it was thought that he might still have it, although he denied that.

William Lyle also had other convictions for violent crime.