Shortly before closing time two masked men burst into The Bell pub in East Street, Walworth, London, on Saturday, August 3rd, 1991, screamed out This is for Abbi! and opened fire. David Brindle was shot dead as he tried to scramble over the bar to safety. A bystander, Stanley Silk, was also shot dead.
Brindles two brothers had been charged with the murder of Ahmet Abdullah in a gangland killing. But David Brindles murder, it seems, had nothing to do with Abbi, and the shout This is for Abbi! was a deliberate red herring.
The likely explanation for the murder was that Brindle had been in a fight with a man who had used a baseball bat on him. The killing, it was said, was to avoid reprisals by Brindle. The masked men remain unidentified.