The six men who murdered Ezra Mills led a chaotic lifestyle, riddled with drugs, guns and mindless violence.

Marcell Mason, 20, Travelle Williams, 18, Dwayne Lock, 20, David Smith, 22, Robert Saint, 20, and the 15-year-old boy, who cannot be named for legal reasons, used to spend time at a flat in the Central Hill estate, their “bolt hole”, where they could do drugs freely and talk about crime and guns.

All men have families, some living in the estate, others nearby, and have attended or were attending school, but they chose to indulge a life of crime which led to Mr Mills’ death.

Mason was known around the estate as Fenz, Lock had a “street name” of Weapz, Williams was known as Snappa and the 15-year-old had also been given an alias.

Referring to each other by those names, they went around the Central Hill estate area committing crimes and terrifying residents.

The Old Bailey heard how on the day Mr Mills was murdered, one of the defendants had been stopped and searched by two police officers near a parade of shops in the estate.

He told officers it was his estate and he could do “whatever he wanted there”.

The group managed to get hold of a shotgun and displayed it around the estate earlier that day, which culminated with the murder of an innocent man.

The gun was never recovered.