Boy tells of finding dead mother

Julie Foster's body was found by her son

A nine-year-old boy has described how he found his mother battered to death in her bed.

The jury at Chelmsford Crown Court were shown the first of three video interviews with Jay Foster - recorded the day after Julie Foster was discovered at her Essex home.

Ms Foster's ex-boyfriend, former Wolverhampton Wanderers player Kim Wassell, 45, denies killing her.

While the video was shown to the jury on Thursday, Jay was in a separate room in the court building watching the recordings. He also had a live video link to the court room.

I went in and looked and mummy was dead and I did not like the look of it

Jay Foster

During the 45-minute interview, Jay was reluctant to describe to officers what he had seen because he said it was "not nice".

He said he had been asleep when he heard someone walk up the stairs at about 0130 BST.

"It seemed creepy," he said in the interview.

He said that he went back to sleep, then heard someone knocking on the door of his home shouting "Julie".

Jay told the police officer interviewing him: "I went, 'Mum there's someone at the door'.

"I went in and looked and mummy was dead and I did not like the look of it.

"I got my quilt and went downstairs ...it was Kim. Kim said: 'Where's mummy' and I said: 'She's dead'."

'Mother bleeding'

When Jay was asked to give more detail about the moment he found his mother, he said: "I went in and said, 'mum' and she was bleeding.

"I won't tell you what she looked like because they (the police officers in the room) won't like it. It's not nice."

When asked what he saw, he told the interviewer: "Just her head."

Jay described how his 41-year-old mother and Mr Wassell had split up a month before her death last July, and that they often argued.

The hearing continues.