A man accused of shooting dead a Brisbane rugby league referee in a cold-blooded execution told an undercover cop he'd been a "good boy" growing up and couldn't imagine firing a gun at anyone, a court has heard.
Tyson John Taylor, 41, has pleaded not guilty to murdering retired accountant Tony McGrath in May 2013, as well as to an attempted murder charge stemming from allegations he set Mr McGrath's Woolloongabba home alight seven months earlier.
His Supreme Court trial on Friday heard evidence from an undercover policeman tasked with befriending Taylor after Mr McGrath's death.
The officer, who cannot be named, said he met Taylor at a buffet dinner on the pretence they'd both won invites after completing a survey.
The court heard Taylor told him he was living in his car at the time but had aspirations to become a patrol car driver.
However, that depended on him passing police checks, he said.
"I said, 'Will you have any problems with these checks?'," the officer told the court.
"He said `I shouldn't. I was a good boy growing up'."
The jury heard the officer then made a joke about his own background, to which Taylor laughed and said: "We all have a past."
He said Taylor also suggested he may be able to get him work as an armed guard but cautioned him about the risks of carrying a weapon.
"He said, 'Though to carry a gun, you have to be able to be willing to use it. I don't think that I would be able to point a gun at someone and actually fire it'."
The Crown alleges Taylor was in love with a prostitute called Susan Stewart - Mr McGrath's supposed fiancee - whom the court heard received more than $550,000 from the late man between July 2009 and May 2013.
But the jury also heard Mr McGrath had racked up debt totalling more than $555,000 by the time he died, with savings of just $8231.
Forensic accountant Christopher Allan said an evaluation of Ms Stewart's finances revealed she and a de facto partner had 22 bank accounts with more than $900,000 in net debt by May 2013.
The jury was also shown a graph charting the mounting debt, alleviated somewhat by sugar-hit contributions from Mr McGrath and others.
The trial before Justice Martin Burns continues.
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