Angela Wrightson murder accused admits changing evidence

The court has heard Angela Wrightson was found dead in her blood-spattered living room with more than 100 injuries

A girl accused of murdering a woman has admitted changing her evidence after hearing expert witnesses at her trial.

Two girls, then aged 13 and 14, deny murdering Angela Wrightson. The older girl admits manslaughter.

Ms Wrightson, 39, was beaten to death in her home in Hartlepool in December 2014.

At Leeds Crown Court, the younger girl denied harming Ms Wrightson despite having told her lawyers she helped the older girl hit her with a table.

She told jurors earlier that she had been present during the attack but did not take part in it.

'Knew it was wrong'

She had then heard evidence from blood-spatter expert Dr Gemma Escott, who had told the jury blood on the younger girl's clothes indicated she had hit Ms Wrightson with a weapon.

Following this, the girl signed a statement for her lawyers saying: "I have not told anyone about hitting Angela Wrightson on the head with a table because after it happened I knew it was wrong".

Then, under cross-examination at the latest hearing, she told the court she had only done that because "that Gemma Escott said I did something and my brain told me to say it about the table".

The younger accused was also asked about her behaviour after leaving Ms Wrightson's home in the early hours of 9 December, when the pair laughed and joked as they telephoned the police for a lift home.

'Smoking a tab'

She admitted taking a photograph of her co-accused in the back of the police van and posting it on Snapchat.

Jamie Hill QC, defence lawyer for the older girl, asked the younger girl: "Did you think anything bad had happened?", to which she replied "No".

She maintains she did not want Ms Wrightson to be killed or harmed, did not attack her and did not encourage the older girl to do so.

"I was just sat on the sofa smoking a tab and looking at Facebook on my phone," she said.

She said she did not think the woman was dead when they left her house.

The trial continues.