By Sammie Jones-
The parents of murdered Essex teenager , Grace Miller, cringed as they joined jurors in watching CCTV footage of their daughter’s accuser pushing a suitcase believed to have contained her corpse.
David and Gillian flew from the family home in Wickford, Essex, to follow the court hearing of her daughter’s accuser’s murder trial.
Grace Millane, of Wickford, Essex, died on the night before her 22nd birthday while travelling in New Zealand. In an earlier hearing, jurors were told that well liked Miller who was on a gap year travelling the world was strangled in the early hours of her 22nd birthday, until she bled through the nose.
The court had been told in an earlier hearing last week that the University of Lincoln Brunnette was seen on CCTV kissing the man in a bar and walking hand-in-hand with him to a city-centre hotel where he lived. She had also text friends to confirm the date was going well. However, statements from the defendant claim they engaged in violent sex that included ”hitting” and ”biting”, and that she had asked him to hold her throat harder.
Jurors heard how Ms Miller’s killer spent an hour after her murder researching how to dispose of her body. He also watched hardcore porn and took intimate photos of her corpse, the mortified court heard. The suspect, who cannot be named for legal reasons, denies murder. The 27 year old defendant claims the beautiful university graduate died after rough consensual sex in which she asked him to put his hands around her neck.
The man had been on a date with Ms Millane the day before he left his Auckland hotel with two suitcases. Prosecutors claim Ms Millane was in one of them.David and Gillian travelled to court from the family home in Wickford, Essex, and watched on from the front row of the public gallery during today’s hearing.
The Auckland High Court also heard from a woman who went on a Tinder date with the 27-year-old defendant the day after Ms Millane’s death.
She said: “He said he had heard of a guy who had asked his girlfriend to have rough sex with him, strangulation and asphyxiation.
“He has tried to revive her but she died and he got sent down for manslaughter.”
She said he had been “intense” while talking about it and empathetic with the man in the story.
The defendant also discussed how his police officer friends had been struggling due to the number of bodies being buried in Waitakere Ranges, the area where Ms Millane’s body was discovered. The case continues.
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