A MURDER suspect denied getting rid of his clothes, shoes and a knife following the fatal stabbing of a disabled pensioner in his own home.

Adam Mason denies murdering his great uncle, 80-year-old Desmond Wooding, in the lounge of his bungalow in Vines Lane, Droitwich. The prosecution say Mason’s family ‘hated’ Mr Wooding because of the way he had treated Adam Mason’s late great aunt Mo when she had cancer. Cross-examination of the 33-year-old of Plough Lane, Tibberton continued at Worcester Crown Court yesterday. The former soldier and groundsman is accused of stabbing Mr Wooding 11 times on June 23 last year.

Adam Mason’s uncle, Mark Mason, 55, of Plough Lane, Tibberton, denies assisting an offender by driving his nephew away from Vines Lane after the alleged murder.

Adrian Keeling QC, prosecuting, said Adam Mason had given his first account to police ‘in complete ignorance of the CCTV that was to come’ and was now ‘trying to fit your lies around the evidence as it emerges’.

The footage places Mason at the nearby Gardeners Arms pub and in Vines Lane with German Shepherd Savvy on the day of the murder. He flew out to Tenerife with his partner two days after Mr Wooding was killed and was arrested at Birmingham Airport upon his return.

When arrested for the murder of Desmond Wooding, Mason replied ‘who?’, describing his great uncle to the jury as a ‘stranger.’

Mason says he lost his phone, possibly leaving it on the plane on the flight out of the UK, only learning of Mr Wooding’s death and that he lived in Vines Lane via social media while abroad.

In his first interview Adam Mason told officers he left the pub at 9.15pm on June 23 last year, calling his uncle for a lift home because of his sciatica. CCTV shows he actually left the pub at 8.42pm. He denied crossing over to Mr Wooding’s side of the road. Mr Keeling said this did not match CCTV evidence which ‘found the lie out.’ The barrister said: “What I would suggest to you is, in ignorance of the CCTV, you were giving a quite deliberate false account.”

Mr Keeling said Mason had wanted to ‘cover up the crucial 20 minutes’ by claiming he left the pub later than he had but the defendant said this was ‘incorrect’. Mason told the jury he answered ‘no comment’ to questions in his second interview because instructed to do so by his solicitor.

Mr Keeling asked Mason why he had answered questions in his first interview and not his second. Mason said: “I was in a state of shock and I didn’t know what I was saying.”

DNA evidence found on Mason’s dog lead was 430,000 times more likely to belong to Mr Wooding than anyone else, the court heard. Mason said that Savvy had been dragging her lead on the ground and he did not know how the DNA got there. Mr Keeling put it to Mason that he and his uncle, described as his ‘lifeline’, went to Crutch Lane after he was picked up, ‘getting advice, maybe even losing the knife’. Mason replied: “That’s incorrect.” “Isn’t it the case you got rid of the top and the shoes and maybe even the jeans as well?” said Mr Keeling.

Mason said the clothes had been in his wardrobe and police had recovered the jeans, identified via a rip in the crotch.

The trial continues.