Bag with woman's head 'stuck out like a sore thumb', murder trial told

A MAKE-UP artist has told a jury of the moment she opened a bag she noticed by a city footpath while walking her dog – and found a woman's head.

Anita Anderson said the blue Ikea bag "stuck out like a sore thumb" by the Hawthornvale Path in Newhaven.

She said: "Being an inquisitive person I wanted to find out what it was. I opened the bag and I think I saw hair."

She was giving evidence on the second day of the trial of Spar shop worker Alan Cameron, who denies murdering mother-of-four Heather Stacey, whose remains were in the bag.

Cameron, 56, has admitted hiding her body for over a year in her flat in Royston Mains Place, Granton, before sawing it up and dumping the body parts.

He has also admitted making repeated withdrawals from her Post Office card account to convince the benefits authorities she was still alive.

Margot Goudie, 58, a support worker who lived in the same block of flats as Ms Stacey, said she had "seemed a very nice person, but had an alcohol problem".

She said she had seen Cameron "ten to a dozen times" in the communal back garden, and in the street, during 2008.

She said he was "always coming and going".

The trial continues.