The step-sister of a stabbed teenager held his hand as he struggled to breathe following a knife attack near his father’s home, a court heard.

In a statement read to a jury at Ipswich Crown Court Candice Sobers described running out of her home in Packard Avenue after being told by her mother that Tavis Spencer-Aitkens had been stabbed on June 2 this year.

Once outside she saw Tavis on the ground by a tree and could see blood on his face and clothing and noticed he was wearing only one trainer.

Ms Sobers asked Tavis: “What happened?” and “Who did it?” to which he replied “J-Block, man”, which she took to be a reference to the street name of a group of men from the Jubilee Park area of the town.

Adebayo Amusa, 20, of Sovereign Road, Barking; Aristote Yenge, 23,from Ipswich; Callum Plaats, 23, from Ipswich; Isaac Calver, 19, from Ipswich; a 16-year-old boy who cannot be named for legal reasons and Leon Glasgow, 42, of no fixed address, all deny murder.

The court heard how Ms Sobers noticed a deep cut to Tavis’ throat, and when she lifted up his shirt she saw a number of injuries to his back.

Her mother came out with some towels and Ms Sobers used them to apply pressure to her step-brother’s wounds.

In her statement Ms Sobers described how she kept talking to Tavis and when he said he couldn’t breathe she reassured him and breathed in and out to try and calm him.

Ms Sobers said she noticed the back of Tavis’ white T-shirt was soaked with blood and she helped him drink sips of water from a glass.

At one stage she asked Tavis: “Who was there?” and he replied: “There were too many of them.”

She described how more towels were brought over to help stem the bleeding but it was “an impossible task”.

Ms Sobers described Tavis begging her not to let go of his hand and asking her to go to the hospital with him.

She said she was still holding Tavis’ hand when an ambulance arrived and she then noticed his breathing was getting worse and that he was drifting in and out of consciousness.

The trial, which is expected to finish in February, continues.