Tenerife beheading: Murder suspect 'haunted by voices'

Jennifer Mills-Westley was living on Tenerife after retiring from her job with Norfolk County Council

A man accused of murdering a British grandmother in Tenerife has told a Spanish court he has no memory of having lived on the Canary Island.

Bulgarian Deyan Deyanov, 29, said he is haunted by voices that "direct how I act", and admitted having taken crack cocaine and LSD before his arrest.

Jennifer Mills-Westley, 60, who was a retired council worker from Norwich, was stabbed repeatedly and decapitated in a Los Cristianos shop in May 2011.

Mr Deyanov has denied murder.

Ms Mills-Westley's two daughters, Sarah and Samantha Mills-Westley, were in court for the first day of Mr Deyanov's trial.

Prosecutor Angel Garcia Rodriguez told the provincial court in the island's capital Santa Cruz that Mr Deyanov had approached Ms Mills-Westley before "attacking and striking her repeatedly with a knife in her back and neck until she was completely decapitated".

'Justice done'

The court was shown CCTV footage of the attack, which took place inside a Chinese-owned supermarket on Avenida Juan Carlos I.

The nine members of the jury were also shown two 22cm-long knives thought to have been used in the attack, one of which was bent and covered in blood.

Speaking in court, Sarah Mills-Westley, from Norwich, said her mother, a grandmother-of-five, had been concerned about safety on the island in the months before her death.

Deyan Deyanov said he could not remember living on the Spanish island

The 43-year-old from Norwich, said: "It was nothing specific but she was increasingly concerned that Tenerife was not as safe as when we used to visit 30 years ago.

"All I want to see is justice done for my mum."

Jennifer Mills-Westley had been living in Tenerife after retiring from her job as a road safety officer with Norfolk County Council.

Mr Deyanov's lawyer, Francisco Beltran, insisted his client had "committed no crime" and claimed he had been a "sick man" living without diagnosis or treatment for acute schizophrenia.

'Kill, fight, hit, pray'

Answering questions in Bulgarian via an interpreter, Mr Deyanov said voices had told him he was "an angel of Jesus Christ who is going to create a new Jerusalem".

"They direct how I act, sometimes they say kill, fight, hit, pray," he added.

Jennifer Mills-Westley was attacked while in a Chinese supermarket in Los Cristianos

Mr Deyanov insisted he did not recognise himself in the CCTV footage of the stabbing and likened it to watching "a montage, a film".

He admitted he had used crack cocaine and LSD before his arrest, but said he had no memory of having lived in Tenerife.

He also could not recall being taken to Tenerife from a psychiatric unit in Seville, Spain, or having lived in Wales, where he was sectioned in 2010 under the Mental Health Act at Glan Clwyd Hospital.

The jury also heard evidence from witness Davide Balsamo, an Italian who has lived in Tenerife for five years.

He said: "I came out of the shop and suddenly I saw him [Deyanov] come off the kerb, completely covered in blood.

"I ran up to him and hit him with all my strength using my motorcycle helmet and knocked him silly."

Mr Garcia Rodriguez is seeking a 20-year jail term, to be served in a secure psychiatric unit.

The trial has been adjourned until Wednesday.