A 22-year-old man accused of involvement in a ‘cowardly’ plot to burn a boy with sulphuric acid ‘loitered’ outside a Worcester school wearing latex gloves days before the alleged attack, a court heard.

Suspicious residents took photographs of three people waiting outside the city school, images shown to the jury at Worcester Crown Court yesterday. The prosecution say the photos show Norbert Pulko, Saied Hussini and Martina Badiova in a black Vauxhall Astra on July 13 last year, the day of what they argue was an aborted acid attack.

Witnesses gave evidence behind a screen about what they saw eight days before a three-year-old boy suffered acid burns at Home Bargains in Worcester on July 21.

The jury has already been played CCTV footage from July 13 showing Pulko following the same family said to have been targeted in the shop just over a week later. The prosecution say the child’s 40-year-old father is the driving force behind the alleged attack.

Pulko was said to have something in his hand outside the school but no acid attack was carried out at that stage.

The first witness became aware of the suspects at around noon on July 13 and handed the photos taken on his phone to police after a media appeal following the acid attack on July 21. He described the suspects as ‘very fidgety'. “One (Pulko) had plastic gloves on like you see at a petrol station” he said.

The man told the jury that the woman (Badiova) walked up and down the road towards the school boundaries.

Pulko was described as walking towards the school while the older male moved the car at around 3.15pm as the children came out. A second witness also described the younger male (Pulko) wearing ‘latex gloves’ which he thought was strange as it was a hot day.

Melanie Simpson, for Pulko, asked the witness if he saw the female (Badiova) walking up and down the street ‘holding hands and kissing’ and ‘canoodling’ with Pulko but he said: “I didn’t see that.”

Another witness said he talked to the older man and asked him what he was doing in the area to which he answered ‘picking up one of his friend’s children from school’.

Police were called at 2.30 but officers did not attend until after the Astra had left. All seven defendants deny conspiracy to apply a corrosive fluid. The trial continues.