Two men have been found guilty for stabbing footballer Cody Fisher to death in Birmingham’s CRANE nightclub.
On December 27, 2022, it was reported that a man had been murdered in the nightclub by a masked group. The victim was eventually revealed to be 23-year-old non-league footballer Cody Fisher.
Upon hearing the incident, CRANE organisers wrote that they were “deeply shocked and saddened”.
“Our thoughts are with the victim, and his family and friends,” they wrote, stressing that they are “working closely with West Midlands Police as they investigate this crime”. CRANE had their license suspended days afterwards, and had its license permanently revoked in January 2023.
Now, the BBC have reported that two men have been convicted for the murder of Fisher at Birmingham Crown Court. The footballer was apparently killed as retribution for making “unavoidable” contact by brushing past Remy Gordon, 23, in Popworld Solihull on Christmas Eve.
He was later tracked down via Gordon’s Snapchat group and stabbed two days later in CRANE. The attack was carried out using a six-inch long blade, serrated on both sides. The court heard that the knife was smuggled into the club due to lax security checks.
Gordon and Kami Carpenter, 22, were both charged with Fisher’s murder on Monday (March 25). Another defendant, 19-year-old Reegan Anderson, was found not guilty of murder, but guilty of affray – as the CPS have confirmed.
Jurors heard there was “no doubt” Gordon was looking for trouble, as he wanted Fisher to “seek his forgiveness”.
Fisher, who played for Birmingham City FC academy and Stratford Town, went to CRANE with his girlfriend and best friend to see a DJ they liked. A close friend of Fisher’s called Sam Newey apparently saw a group of people including Gordon wearing balaclavas several hours before the attack, and tried to unsuccessfully convince Fisher to leave CRANE.
Two men have today been found guilty of the murder of Cody Fisher, who was stabbed to death on the dancefloor of a Birmingham nightclub on Boxing Day, 2022.
The semi-professional footballer had been on a night out with friends when he was attacked following an ‘insignificant’… pic.twitter.com/8evb9AOWJ0
— London & UK Street News (@CrimeLdn) March 25, 2024
Up to 10 men surrounded Fisher in the club around 11.30pm, where one member headbutted him. The group then began punching Fisher, until he was eventually stabbed in the chest and leg. Despite CPR being administered by security, a post-mortem showed the blade penetrated the main valve to his heart.
CCTV later showed Gordon “mocking and smiling” about the stabbing as he went to a pizza takeaway around 45 minutes after the attack. He was also shown imitating a kicking motion “and repeating what had taken place”.
The jury heard that Carpenter also admitted separately to a friend he stabbed someone in the chest and left the weapon at the scene. The group Snapchat also contained messages referencing the attack, such as “man says he’s dead”, with another user confirming: “Ah, good he’s deffo dead”.
Newey also told jurors Gordon rang him after the stabbing, opening his nine-minute call with the line: “I am not going to lie, I have just banged both your boys out.”
Police concluded that although there were no clear images of who stabbed Fisher, they believed Carpenter was responsible. Gordon was tried as part of a joint enterprise, where more than one person can be prosecuted for a murder even if they didn’t physically carry out the attack if they were involved in the planning of someone’s murder.
Gordon and Carpenter will be sentenced at Birmingham Crown Court on April 8.
Mr Fisher’s brother Stephen said his death had “ruined the family”
“We all kind of lived and done our best for Cody and now he’s no longer here, it’s hard to come to terms with what to do,” he said.
Along with being a footballer, Fisher was a PE teacher in schools, according to his mother: “He had more living to do and so much more love and kindness to give to the world.”
Mrs Fisher further added: “So you can bump into somebody in a pub or a club or whatever accidentally and that is the repercussion to be that evil, for that retribution of within half an hour trying to find out, getting Cody’s picture from social media, speaking to whoever and asking the question, ‘Who is Cody Fisher?’
“I’m sure that’s a question that they’ll never ever need to ask again because they will know that forever, for as long as they shall live I suppose.”