A church organist was battered to death by two men as he walked to play at midnight mass on Christmas Eve last year, a court has heard.
Alan Greaves, 68, suffered "grave and catastrophic" head injuries and died three days after the attack, which occurred as he went to St Saviour's church in High Green, Sheffield.
The two men were later spotted laughing in a nearby park. Nothing was taken and robbery did not appear to be the motive, Sheffield crown court was told.
Prosecutor Robert Smith, QC, said the lay preacher had been attacked by Jonathan Bowling and Ashley Foster as he set out to play the organ at the service, something he had done for 40 years.
A pick-axe handle was used in the attack, along with a second unidentified weapon, possibly a hammer.
Foster, 22, of High Green denies one count of murder. The jury was told that Bowling, also 22, of Pitsmoor, Sheffield, has already admitted killing the pensioner.
Opening the case, Smith said the two were close, like brothers, and had been drinking a combination of lager and Bacardi and Coke before the attack.
Smith said Greaves had left his home to go to the church shortly after 11pm that night carrying his briefcase and leaving behind his wife, Maureen, two of his children – Alison and Peter – his twin grandchildren and a friend of his daughter. He never returned home.
The prosecutor described how Greaves suffered head injuries similar to those seen in a car crash or a fall from a height.
A post-mortem examination showed he had been hit at least three times, with part of his head being hit so hard that the bones splintered into a number of pieces. One of the bone fragments was found at the scene of the attack.
Fragments of wood found embedded in his injuries were matched to a pick-axe found at Bowling's sister's home, the jury heard.
Scientific analysis of the pensioner's damaged hat showed a second weapon must have been used in the assault, said Smith.
The two accused men were arrested in January after police released CCTV footage of the men they wanted to talk to.
Foster handed himself in to police but told officers that it was Bowling who carried out the attack and that he had nothing to do with it, the jury of six men and six women heard.
The defendant told a friend that Bowling said to him after the attack: "That's me being normal, so imagine me when I'm on one. If you tell anybody, I'm going to set your kids on fire and torture you."
Foster told his mother that his friend kept repeating: "I'm going to smash someone's head in," and told him to watch before running at the pensioner.
Foster claimed that Bowling had been threatening to attack someone else with a hammer earlier, the prosecutor said.
Smith said: "The prosecution case is that both of these men were in this together. Together they went out on Christmas Eve looking for a suitable victim to attack and the two men together followed Greaves as he walked to St Saviour's Church."
Smith said Foster spoke to a police officer at the scene of the attack the day after Greaves died in hospital.
"He described the attack to the police officer as 'disgraceful', saying he hoped [those responsible] would get hammered in prison for beating up an old man," the prosecutor said.
Smith said the prosecution rejected Foster's version of events. He said CCTV evidence showed the two men together and the evidence of two weapons being used also pointed to them both being responsible.
He told the jury: "In short, the prosecution say that these two men were walking the streets looking for a suitable victim. If it hadn't been Mr Greaves, it would have been someone else." The case continues.