Six days before Chris Kaba was shot dead, dramatic CCTV footage captured him shooting dead a rival gang member in a crowded nightclub.
Kaba, 24, who has multiple convictions for assault and weapons possession, was seen shooting Brandon Maltosi at close range as terrified revellers took cover. The brazen gunman, clad in a balaclava and grey tracksuit, calmly pursues his target as he flees for his life through the streets of east London.
On Monday 6 September 2022, after Metropolitan police sniper Martin Blake was acquitted of killing Kabas at a police stop, details of the shocking attack began to emerge. The jury was not told about the previous week’s nightclub shooting after Judge Goss refused a request from Blake’s lawyer to introduce it as evidence.
They also did not know that Kaba already had a long list of convictions at the age of 13. The thug was sentenced to four years in prison in 2019 for possessing an imitation firearm with intent to incite fear of violence after a shooting in Canning Town, east London.
Shocking video footage captured the moment Kaba fired a smuggled revolver into a Notting Hill Carnival afterparty at the Oval Space club in Hackney, east London, on August 30, 2022, sending dozens of terrified clubbers running for cover. Martosi, 25 at the time, survived the attack despite losing a lot of blood from gunshot wounds to both thighs.
He was a member of the so-called “17 Gang”, named after his 17-year-old brother Jordan Martosi, who was murdered in a Reading nightclub on 1 July 2017. Kaba’s rival 67 Mob had been embroiled in a bloody turf war with a group based in the Wandsworth Road area of ​​south-west London, his trial at the Old Bailey heard in February.
Surveillance video played in court showed Kaba and his gang entering the club with canisters of nitrous oxide and balloons. The pistol was smuggled past searches and scanners in a handbag by 67 member Marcus Pottinger, 30.
Pottinger had previously worked at the pub and was seen shaking hands and hugging security guards. CCTV footage from inside the club showed the bag to be in the possession of another gang member, Shemaiah Bell, 31.
The group were filmed lounging around the packed bar, drinking and chatting, while unsuspecting clubbers danced along with them. A masked suspect, Kaba, was then seen walking towards Bell, who himself made a weapon signal with his hand before the bag was handed over.
Kaba puts on a pair of black gloves and pulls his hood up. He looks repeatedly in the direction of Martosi, who is standing a few metres away in a black down jacket. The gunman then walks towards his unsuspecting target, who is standing next to a woman with glasses and looking at her mobile phone. Kaba faces his victim from a few metres away and raises his right arm before firing.
Martosi stumbles backwards from the impact of the explosion. He then runs for his life, frantically weaving his way through the crowded dance floor to the exit. Kaba calmly returns to his group at the bar and follows his target out of the club. As staff panic and stunned onlookers flee, Kaba trots out, followed by his drink-carrying companions.
A woman falls in a doorway and is trampled by the panicked crowd, before being lifted up as Kaba slips through them, his weapons bag still tucked under his left arm. An outside camera shows Martosi fleeing with panicked club-goers, who smash through two metal barriers in a desperate attempt to escape.
Kaba emerged 18 seconds later, walking just inches past the security guard who was talking into his radio. A few minutes later, another camera captured Martosi on camera, apparently believing him to have escaped.
He walked to his parked car and spotted Kaba charging toward him from across the street, gun drawn. Kaba fired several shots, hitting Martosi in the right buttocks as he sprinted down the sidewalk.
The shooter was then filmed returning to the club and getting into the back of a waiting Range Rover. Footage from another camera on a nearby street showed the victim bleeding profusely as he tried to get into a parked mini-taxi.
Martosi leaned against the car, blood beginning to flow through the right leg of his jeans, quickly forming a puddle at his feet. Water pooled on the pavement around him, and he stumbled and collapsed.
Police arrived quickly by rescue helicopter, and Martosi was taken to the Royal London Hospital. He was treated with anti-nausea medication, a tetanus booster, intravenous painkillers, antibiotics, a blood transfusion, and bandages.
The bullet penetrated the front of his left thigh, leaving a 15mm wound in the back of his leg. The second bullet penetrated the back of his right thigh, narrowly missing a major artery.
Martosi was released from hospital later that night against medical advice, with small bullet fragments still lodged in his right leg. Six days later, Kaba was shot dead in Streatham Hill, south-west London, after his Audi was stopped by an arms expert for alleged involvement in a shooting near Brixton the previous night.
Blake did not know that Kaba had been driving the car, or that it was not connected to the nightclub shooting. Pottinger and Bell were found guilty by a jury in February 2024 of inflicting grievous bodily harm and possessing a firearm with intent to cause fear of violence, after a three-month trial.
Pottinger was sentenced to nine years in prison and Bell to ten years. Another of Kaba’s aides, Connell Bamboy, 28, was convicted of weapons offences and sentenced to five years and six months in prison.
Judge Simon Mayo told the court he believed Kaba was the shooter. He said a number of club-goers were standing next to the victim when Kaba opened fire, potentially causing “death or serious injury”.
“There is no doubt that Kaba decided to shoot after spotting Martosi in the nightclub,” the judge said, adding that the shooting came as the 67 gang was fighting for control of a drug trafficking network.
Prosecutor Karim Khalil KC said: We are saying they were targeting him because they wanted to shoot him.'” He was originally charged with conspiring with Kaba to kill Martosi, but those charges were dropped.