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THE MAN ACCUSED of the murder of five-year-old April Jones in Wales kept pictures of her on his computer.
BBC News reports that Mark Bridger, 47, of Ceinws, Powys, Wales also stored images of April’s half-sisters, other local girls and child murder victims.
The prosecution claims the defendant murdered April in a sexually motivated attack, however, Bridger said he accidentally hit her with his car but does not remember what he did with her body. A young witness says April climbed willingly into Bridger’s car.
The court in Wales also heard how Bridger approached April’s half-sister on Facebook last year, and tried to ‘friend’ her.
Mark Bridger arrives at Mold Crown Court. (Images: Peter Byrne/PA Wire)
Bridger is accused of abducting and murdering April last October but denies all charges against him including perverting the course of justice.
The schoolgirl’s disappearance sparked one of the biggest police searches ever mounted in Britain and drew in hundreds of local people to scour the mountainous area, but her body has never been found.
The trial heard that blood and tiny bone fragments found at Bridger’s cottage were a near-perfect match with April’s DNA.
Bridger, an experienced slaughterman who once worked at an abattoir, denies abducting and murdering April as she played near her home in the small town of Machynlleth in mid-Wales on October 1 last year.
Coral and Paul Jones, the parents of April Jones arrive at Mold Crown Court. (Image: Peter Byrne/PA Wire)
The prosecution says he went to great lengths to clean up the evidence of her murder, although police officers who went to his home had not realised the significance of his efforts at the time.
Earlier on the day that April vanished, Bridger exchanged text messages with his ex-girlfriend Vicky Fenner about their relationship that she had broken off.
Bridger then allegedly texted his employer to ask for the day off and went to collect a benefit payment before returning home, viewing indecent images on his computer, looking at photos of local girls on Facebook and asking three women for dates on the social networking site.
Additional reporting © AFP, 2013
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