A kickboxer has denied being a professional hitman who shot dead a reality television star’s brother – telling a jury he was in London to “Netflix and chill” with a woman he met online.

Anis Hemissi, 24, is alleged to have been the gunman who murdered Flamur Beqiri, 36, in front of his family in Battersea on Christmas Eve in 2019.

He is one of six men on trial over the fatal shooting, along with one man from Islington.

The Gazette has been covering the trial currently ongoing at Southwark Crown Court where prosecutors claim Mr Beqiri - the older brother Misse Beqiri, who appeared in reality television show The Real Housewives Of Cheshire - was killed as a result of escalating violence between two rival gang networks.

Hemissi is said to have donned disguises to carry out reconnaissance in the days before the shooting.

He was allegedly part of a team of four killers from Sweden, with Estevan Pino-Munizaga, 35, Tobias Fredrik Andersson, 32, and Bawer Karaer, 23, also charged with murder.

All four deny the charge.

Clifford Rollox, 31, of Islington, and 21-year-old Dutch national Claude Isaac Castor, from Sint Maarten in the Caribbean, allegedly "cleared up and removed the tools of the killer’s trade”.

They deny perverting the course of justice.

Giving evidence today - Monday, January 10 - Hemissi said he flew to London from Copenhagen on December 20 2019 to meet a 22-year-old woman, Nadine, who had befriended him on Facebook.

He told jurors she was one of “more than 20 girls” he was speaking to on social media and dating apps, including Tinder, at the time.

"She asked if I wanted to come to London because she lived there,” he said.

“We were going to have Netflix and chill, relax, maybe go out and eat something, maybe go out and buy some clothes.

Jurors were shown CCTV footage of the shooting, which saw Mr Begiri hit by eight bullets as the gunman fired 10 times.

Addressing Hemissi, David Harounoff, defending, said: “The prosecution say you were the gunman. Were you the gunman?"

Hemissi replied: “No, sir.”

He denies murder and possession of a self-loading pistol.

The trial continues.