'Vampire' killer could still be at large

A crank who murdered Mabel Leyshon in a "ritual" killing could still be on the loose, a court was told.

Defence barrister Robin Spencer QC told the murder trial jury at Mold Crown Court there was a real risk that an innocent teenager could be wrongly convicted.

Mrs Leyshon's murder shocked villagers

A 17-year-old boy from Anglesey has been accused of killing 90-year-old widow Mrs Leyshon at her home in Llanfairpwll.

It was suggested he had killed her in a bizarre attempt to achieve immortality, and had drunk her blood.

Mr Spencer said police investigations had revealed a number of "strange" characters with unusual obsessions - far more sinister than the defendant's interests.

The jury was told that the defence disputed much of the evidence presented.

No saliva tests

Mr Spencer said there was no evidence to show that the blood found in a saucepan at the defendant's home had been drunk - as had been suggested by the prosecution.

Neither had there been evidence that it had been put to someone's lip - as no saliva tests had been carried out.

Mr Spencer also dismissed evidence linking the crime to an incident two months earlier, when it was alleged that the defendant had asked a German language student to bite him.

Without knowledge of the earlier vampire incident, the prosecution would have had no explanation for the murder, he said.

Forensic officers searched Mabel Leyshon's house

And he added that it was unfair to suggest that, because of the earlier incident, his client must be the murderer.

In the earlier incident, the defendant had been out of control while taking cannabis - yet the murder had been carried out by someone cool and calculating.

"Is this 17-year-old dyslexic, somewhat naive young man who lacks self-assurance, the brutal, calculated evil, cold-blooded killer the prosecution suggest he must be?", he said.

He wondered why, if the defendant was as cunning as alleged, he would have had vital pieces of evidence - shoes and a knife - in his bedroom.

Other suspects

The jury was told that, although the police had shown an interest in people with experience of butchery, such lines of inquiry were dropped once the defendant was arrested.

Others had fallen under suspicion, too, Mr Spencer said - including a man preoccupied with vampires and the occult from an early age, who had nailed a bird to a crucifix, and who was said to have driven past Mrs Leyshon's home and talked about ripping her heart out several months before the murder?

The man was never positively linked with the crime, but neither was he positively eliminated, he said.

The trial, before Mr Justice Richards, is proceeding.