NEIGHBOURS heard a "horrendous bang" the night a woman was ambushed and gunned down by two masked heroin dealers, a court heard.

Kerry Reeves was shot in the face at close range in an alleyway behind a row of homes in Abingdon at about 8pm on November 3, and two men are now on trial charged with her murder.

Giving evidence at Oxford Crown Court this morning neighbour Sharon Ponting said she jumped in her seat at the noise outside her home in Thornhill Walk.

She told a jury of seven woman and five men she could hear someone shouting "my friend is dying" from her balcony.

She added: "It was a bang, a horrendous loud bang. It made me jump on my seat.

"My son went out in to the balcony and came straight back saying there are two men outside shouting 'help, help'.

"I went out on to the balcony and asked what was going on.

"They said 'where are we? Our friend is dying'."

Mrs Ponting rushed out and took the phone from one of the distressed men to tell emergency services where they were.

Miss Reeves, 26, was rushed to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford but died two days later.

The court heard on Monday Miss Reeves and two friends had armed themselves with baseball bats that night to go hunting for heroin dealers Billy Johnson and Charles Noble.

Prosecutor Mark Fenhalls QC said there was a history of violence between that pair and Miss Reeves and her friends.

When Miss Reeves and her friends spotted 21-year-old Noble that night they chased him but he escaped.

As Miss Reeves went through the alley behind the homes, her friends Craig Pitts and Craig Parslow heard a loud bang.

Mr Pitts said he saw Miss Reeves fall to the ground with blood pouring from her face while Mr Parslow claimed he saw two masked men just before the shot.

Mr Fenhalls said although only Johnson and Noble knew who had pulled the trigger they had both ambushed and shot Miss Reeves.

Johnson, of Ripon Court, Corby, Northants, and Noble, of Kempton Avenue, Northolt, Ealing, both deny murder.

The trial continues.