Alesha MacPhail: ‘Mountain of evidence’ against murder accused

There is a “mountain” of evidence against a teenager accused of abducting, raping and murdering six-year-old Alesha MacPhail, a jury has been told.

Alesha MacPhail, six, was found dead in woodland on the Isle of Bute

Advocate depute Iain McSporran said the 16-year-old accused, who cannot be named for legal reasons, had told a “pack of lies” from the witness box at the High Court in Glasgow.

Mr McSporran was addressing the jury in his closing speech on the eighth day of the Alesha MacPhail murder trial.

The schoolgirl had arrived at the home her grandparents shared with her father, Robert or Rab MacPhail, on the Isle of Bute for the school holidays shortly before she went missing on 2 July last year.

Her body was found in woods on the island hours later.

Mr McSporran invited the jury to convict the 16-year-old, saying the only “true” verdict would be to find him guilty.

He said: “We say he raped and murdered her and that’s the verdict we seek.”

Mr McSporran said the evidence “points squarely” to her being abducted and taken to where she was found by the person who killed her, which he claimed was the accused.

He said the timing of a figure being caught on CCTV, and who some witnesses said appeared to be carrying something, “fits perfectly” with this version of events.

The teenager has said he lied to police about his actions when Alesha went missing, claiming he did so to protect the woman he blames for the killing – Toni McLachlan, the partner of Alesha’s father.

He has lodged a special defence of incrimination blaming Ms McLachlan for the crime.

Giving evidence on Tuesday, he told the court he and Ms McLachlan had met up and had sex early on 2 July, but he did not want to tell police this as he feared it would get back to Mr MacPhail and he would “hurt” Ms McLachlan.

Mr McSporran said the accused was telling “a pack of lies then [to the police] and a pack of lies in the witness box yesterday”.

He put it to the jury they had heard no evidence implicating Ms McLachlan in the crime, but a “mountain of evidence” linking the accused to it.

The QC also highlighted the accused telling the court Ms McLachlan could have been “fantasising about killing Alesha for months”.

Mr McSporran said: “Where did that come from? Who’s been fantasising?”

He said the accused’s claim Ms McLachlan took the condom the two allegedly used on 2 July, went back to the house where she had been staying with her partner, Alesha and the girl’s grandparents, abducted the schoolgirl, carried her to the woods, smothered her to death and then planted the accused’s DNA inside her was a “preposterous story”.

Mr McSporran said the DNA matching the accused was “pretty well all over” Alesha’s body and clothes. He said the Crown’s case is his DNA was found inside the six-year-old as he had raped her.

The accused denies abducting, raping and murdering Alesha.

A charge he faced of attempting to hide evidence was dropped by the Crown today.

Giving evidence last Wednesday, Ms McLachlan denied being responsible for Alesha’s death, saying she “loved” the schoolgirl.

She also denied suggestions by the defence she had sex with the accused on 2 July, then planted his DNA on Alesha, before “attacking and brutalising her” and murdering her.

The case continues.