April Jones murder trial jury resumes deliberations

A jury has resumed deliberations in the trial of a man accused of murdering five-year-old April Jones.

April Jones. Picture: PA

Mark Bridger, 47, is alleged to have snatched the schoolgirl as she played with a friend near their homes on the Bryn-Y-Gog estate, Machynlleth, Powys, on October 1 last year.

The prosecution at Mold Crown Court claimed it was a “sexually motivated” attack.

Bridger, a former slaughterhouse worker, denies abduction, murder and intending to pervert the course of justice by unlawfully disposing, destroying or concealing April’s body.

April’s body was never found despite the largest search in British policing history.

The defendant claims he killed the youngster when he accidentally “crushed” her with his Land Rover but cannot remember what he did with the body because he was drunk and panicking.

Drops of her blood and fragments of bone, thought to have come from an adolescent human, were found by forensics officers at his cottage, Mount Pleasant, in Ceinws, Powys, the jury heard.

The nine women and three men were initially sent out to begin deliberations at 1.55pm yesterday following a month-long trial.

They resumed at 10.06am today.