A schoolboy told police he stabbed an autistic man in a Sydney public toilet block after the man tried to grab him in a bear hug, a jury has been told.
In the crown's opening address in the NSW Supreme Court today, prosecutor Margaret Cunneen SC said the teenager had told police the man had emerged from a cubicle wearing underpants, but with his trousers around his knees.
The teenager, who was 16 at the time and cannot be named, has pleaded not guilty to murdering Gerard Fleming, 35, at Narrabeen on Sydney's northern beaches in June last year.
Ms Cunneen told the jury Mr Fleming had suffered from Asperger's syndrome, a form of autism, and said the Narrabeen toilet block was known as a gay beat, where homosexual men engaged in sexual activity after dark.
She said the teenager had told police he had given Mr Fleming a beer, which they had drunk inside the public toilet because it was raining.
The teenager had said Mr Fleming emerged from a toilet cubicle, approached him and joked, "I'm giving you a wedgie."
He had said the man grabbed him "in a kind of bear hug" and he had then stabbed him twice with a folding knife he was carrying in his pocket, Ms Cunneen said.
The trial is continuing before Justice David Kirby.
