| Football violence role 'was pretence' |
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An alleged football hooligan featured in a BBC television documentary has told a court that he was only pretending to be involved in violence.
Jason Marriner said he did so to "big himself up" in front of investigative journalists Donal MacIntyre and Paul Atkinson, who he thought were drug dealers. Marriner, 33, and his co-defendant Andrew Frain, 36, are being tried on charges of affray and conspiracy to commit violent disorder. The prosecution has alleged they are members of a football hooligan gang called the Chelsea Headhunters. Mr Marriner told London's Blackfriars Crown Court that he had talked to the journalists, from the documentary MacIntyre Undercover, about fights with fans from Millwall, Aston Villa, Tottenham Hotspur and other clubs. But he stressed that he was not actually involved in the trouble. Mr Marriner said his one previous conviction for football violence had been in 1997, after he pushed a Leicester fan who said he wished Nottingham Forest supporters instead of Liverpool fans had died in the Hillsborough disaster. "People don't deserve to die over a game of football," Mr Marriner said. 'Storyteller and joker' He told the jury that he had lied to Mr MacIntyre about putting Irish number plates on his camper van so that he could get into France for the World Cup in 1998. He said: "I told him I'd changed the number plates to Irish plates to be able to get through the cordon, but I was trying to big myself up. "I had Irish plates on it anyway and I tried to pretend I had changed them." Mr Michael Wolkind QC, defending Mr Marriner, said it was important to distinguish between "Jason Marriner the storyteller and joker" and the "thug" that the BBC "pretend he is". Mr Marriner, of Hampton Road, Feltham, Middlesex, and Mr Frain, of Granville Road, Reading, both deny affray on 30 January 1999, and conspiracy to commit violent disorder between 15 August and 21 November 1998. The case continues.
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