Wife beaten with hammer court told

MURDER accused Yahya Babiker bought a claw hammer from Homebase hours before his wife's badly beaten body was found in a blood-soaked bath, a jury has heard.

Babiker spent 3.99 on the hammer which prosecutors allege he then used to smash his wife Randa Kamblawi's skull.

Final prosecution witness Dr Ralph Bouhaidar told the High Court in Perth yesterday that some of the wounds on Mrs Kamblawi's head were consistent with hammer blows.

He said Babiker's claim that his wife had fallen twice in the bath and hit her head on the taps was "very unlikely, if not impossible" in explaining her head injuries.

The consultant forensic pathologist said of one of the five distinct head wounds she sustained: "The features of this wound would be consistent with being caused by a heavy, round, blunt object, such as a hammer. We are of the opinion the hammer is the most likely instrument in this case."

Babiker, 45 denies murdering his wife by repeatedly hitting her with a claw hammer at her home at Nicolson Street, Edinburgh, on 19 or 20 October last year. He has claimed to police that she had slipped in the bath and hit her head on the taps twice.

A second charge of attempting to defeat the ends of justice was formally withdrawn by Advocate Depute Pino di Medio at the conclusion of the Crown case.

The trial continues.